By Corey Schmidt
The Sacramento Bee
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California state prisons were recently called into question over its food programs. An Office of the Inspector General audit of prison food services revealed sanitation concerns, including moldy food and facilities.
“Our observations found several deficiencies at three of the prisons we reviewed including sanitation issues such as improper food storage practices, and equipment issues such as scullery machines that did not properly sanitize food trays and utensils,” Inspector General Amarik Singh said in the audit report.
Auditors visited four Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation facilities to perform the audit. These on-site visits were at on‑site visits at California State Prison , Sacramento in September 2025 and October 2025 ; California State Prison , Corcoran and Central California Women’s Facility in October 2025 ; and Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility in December 2025 .
The Central California Women’s Facility had fewer deficiencies compared to the other three, according to the report, signalling to auditors that CDCR-managed facilities have the ability to adhere to food sanitation standards. Singh called it “an example of how a kitchen in a prison setting should be maintained.”
One of the key concerns, especially at the CSP-Corcoran, was lackluster scheduling to ensure foods are discarded before going bad. At CSP-Corcoran, auditors found rotten tomatoes and moldy peppers.
Moldy ceilings, spiderwebs and bug-covered fly traps were also found in the kitchen, according to the report. Moldy ceilings were also a concern at CSP-Sacramento.
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It isn’t unusual to see moldy food at prisons, according to Aishatu Yusuf, vice president of innovation programs at Impact Justice, a California -based organization that address food sanitation at prisons.
“Across the country, incarcerated people lack access to healthy, adequate, safe food,” Yusuf said in a statement. “In our own research, 75% of formerly incarcerated people we surveyed nationwide reported being served moldy or rotten food while in prison. We heard countless examples of unsanitary conditions and insufficient meals.”
She said CDCR works to bring fresh produce to correctional facilities through programs like Harvest of the Month. The Central California Women’s Facility, which was not docked for moldy food, is also home to Growing Justice. The program brings a vertical farm of stacked growing systems to grow crops at the facility.
All four facilities were missing at least some daily logs for kitchen utensils used by inmates working in the kitchen, according to the report released this summer. When an inmate uses a utensil from the locked room it’s kept in, they must check it out from an officer.
Auditors also expressed concerns about items that went missing for several days. This includes a wire whip and cube steak cutters.
“This is particularly concerning because an incarcerated person could have manipulated the wire whip into a weapon,” the OIG report said.
State corrections officials say the agency is developing a department-wide corrective action strategy to bolster food safety and equipment oversight.
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