Tonya has been working in Food Safety for almost 40 years. Her career began in regulatory with Agriculture and Public Health, both local and state level. However, the last 15 years included consulting for Education and Industry. Much of her focus has been on regulation/guidance creation, interpretation and application. This work has continued most recently by verifying FDA Food Code references for Industry.
She has participated in the Conference for Food Protection as a delegate, regulator and consumer member. She has been a member of International Association of Food Protection and National Environmental Health Association, and past president of both Georgia Association of Food Protection and Georgia Environmental Health Association. She obtained registration as a Sanitarian early in her career with Agriculture while regulating retail, manufacturing and wholesale food processing operations. She obtained registration with both NEHA and GEHA, as well as standardized by FDA every three years as required to standardize and train regulators to provide uniform enforcement of the FDA model Food Code. Maintaining knowledge of Conference for Food Protection guidance for the model FDA Food Code is an ongoing interest for her even though updating local/state Food Codes, inspection forms, and guidance documents is no longer her in her job description, as she has been retired from the state of Georgia for ten years.
Since her retirement from public service, she has focused on aiding industry in maintaining food safety during challenging innovations, public health/food safety crisis and emergencies, and evolving code requirements. She has regulated, trained, standardized, interpreted, provided guidance and consult to those who regulate or operate retail, manufacturing, processing, food service, catering, mobile, and interstate commerce food establishments for the US and Canada. You will find she has a working knowledge of both FDA and Canadian Food Codes, as well as many local US jurisdiction codes.
