HONOLULU -- People in Hawaii love to dine out at all kinds of eateries. There are about 5,800 restaurants on Oahu, and the results of some inspections might make you think twice about dining out.

KITV recently dug through two months worth of restaurant inspection reports from July and August.

In mid-August, a customer complained about finding a roach in a hamburger from a Honolulu fast-food restaurant. Two days later, an inspector found dead roaches in a plastic paper sheet cover at the same restaurant.

The state sends inspectors on unannounced inspections of restaurants. KITV followed along as inspector Raena Nishimura checked the conditions at Downtown Coffee, a coffee bar off Fort Street Mall.

"Just looking in the cupboards for any signs of droppings of rodents, roach droppings," Nishimura said.

There were none of those at Downtown Coffee, but an inspector found a live rat under the sink at a Kalihi noodle shop recently.

At another downtown restaurant, an inspector found mold in a soda dispenser, just a few days after a customer complained of finding mold in some lemonade.

Rex Mitsunaga oversees the Department of Health's Sanitation Branch, which handles restaurant inspections.

"A lot of people think because it's just soda, it can't grow anything because it's an acidic type of food," Mitsunaga said.

Back at Downtown Coffee, the inspector found no violations. The owner was happy to have passed the health inspection.

"They're pretty thorough, so we know we have to be always clean just in case they're coming in and inspecting us, which is good," Downtown Coffee owner Charles Nelson said.

The refrigerator temperature was cold enough there, but the most frequent violation at other restaurants is when refrigerators are too warm. There have been 70 fridge violations on Oahu since July 1.

The second most frequent violation deals with employee hand-washing. Either they fail to wash their hands when returning from the bathroom or outside, or the restaurant is out of soap or paper towels.

"That is to prevent any continued growth of bacteria in food that may lead to food-borne illness," Nishimura said.

MOST COMMON VIOLATIONS
Year	Food Storage Refrigeration	Lavatory Facilities Hand-Washing	Equipment/Utensil Clean & Sanitize
2009	70	42	37
2008	85	47	67

The only way to find violations and get dirty restaurants to clean up their act is to inspect them on a regular basis.

"Our supervisor would like to have our establishments inspected twice a year, but that's impossible," Nishimura said.

It is impossible because budget cuts have left a small number of inspectors to handle thousands of restaurants.

NUMBER OF INSPECTIONS July 1-Sept. 30
Year	Inspections/ Restaurants	Restaurants Available	Inspectors
2009	1,385	9,876	27
2008	1,772	7,800	28.75
2007	2,026	7,456	29

How Do You File A Complaint?

If you have a complaint about health or sanitation conditions at a restaurant or any establishment that serves food, call the state Health Department Sanitation Branch at 586-8000, during the hours of 7:45 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

You can make an anonymous complaint or leave your name and phone number so inspectors can call you back to gather more information. Inspectors will keep your identity confidential.

An inspector will make an unannounced inspection of the establishment as soon as possible to investigate your complaint. The inspector will call you back, if you wish, to give you the results of the investigation once it is completed.