Inspectors close more city restaurants

(New York - WABC, March 1, 2007) (WABC) -- The company that owns KFC, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut preemptively closed a handful of its city restaurants after Health Department inspectors found conditions that "obviously do not meet our strict restaurant standards."

The closed restaurants are all franchises operated by ADF Companies of Fairfield, N.J. - the firm that also runs the ratty KFC/Taco Bell franchise on Sixth Avenue.

The Health Department closed the rat-infested Sixth Avenue KFC/Taco Bell last week -- and vowed to reinspect all other restaurants operated by ADF Companies.

After a day of reinspections yesterday, the company that owns KFC, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut decided to close all its ADF Companies franchises that have not yet been inspected by the Health Department.

"These few franchise units, operated by ADF in New York, obviously do not meet our strict restaurant standards based on health inspection reports," said Emil Brolick, President U.S. Brands, Yum! Brands, Inc.

"They will remain closed until we are absolutely certain they will operate at our high standards. We apologize to our customers and are taking every action, with the assistance of external sanitation experts, to get to the bottom of this. We are redoubling our efforts to inspect every restaurant and are reinforcing all our restaurant cleaning and sanitation procedures," Brolick said.

"We are absolutely committed to our customers and have worked with ADF (a franchisee of KFC, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut), to close their uninspected restaurants in New York until they are fully inspected by the health department and given a clean bill of health. We will not compromise on our food and restaurant quality," Brolick added.

A spokesman for Yum! Brands would not say how many KFC, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut restaurants were preemptively closed.

ADF Companies owns 20 fast food restaurants in the city, and runs nearly 400 franchise restaurants across the U.S. They are the second-largest Pizza Hut-franchise operator in the country.

Click here to view New York City inspection information for any restaurant!

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