Until recently, the common victualler license was among the most overlooked of city permits, according to Boston licensing officials. The license is required of every establishment capable of cooking, preparing and serving food.
An official in the city licensing department says that, in the past, the office had lacked solid communication with other city departments that also issue permits and the licensing division’s small staff has been unable to keep close tabs on whether businesses that need the license actually have one.
Meanwhile, some food service providers, including major, longstanding Boston institutions, have overlooked, for years if not decades, their need to ever obtain the permit that renews annually.
Some organizations that provide food service as a secondary function to their core business, like hospitals, say that in the past they did not think their food courts and cafeterias needed the license.
“For years, a lot of these places didn’t have them,” the chief handler of “CV” license application and issuance, licensing board administrative clerk Nancy Mickiewicz, said by phone recently. “There are so many places in Boston that sometimes some go unnoticed.”
Now, tthe Boston licensing department has launched a new effort aimed at making the common victualler license less rare.
Read more: Boston trying to make common victualler license less uncommon
Article author: Matt Rocheleau, Town Correspondent, Globe Staff