PONTIAC Mich. A lawmaker has proposed that the northern suburbs of this industrial city follow the lead of New York City and prohibit restaurants from serving foods containing trans fats, according to local press reports.
Acommissioner of Oakland County, a 1.2-million-person area outside of Detroit, introduced a resolution Thursday that would direct health officials to rewrite the county’s health code to outlaw trans fats in restaurant fare by December 2008.
The measure has yet to be considered by Marcia Gershenson’s fellow Oakland County commissioners, but county executive L. Brooks Patterson has told local media that he will look at the proposal.
The Michigan Restaurant Association has publicly voiced concerns about the ban.
It was not clear at presstime if the code changes sought by Gershenson would merely limit the amount of trans fat that could be contained in restaurant food, as the New York provision does, or if it would ban the treated ingredient altogether. Nor were there indications of whether the measure would require chains that provide nutritional information to post it on their menu boards, another provision of the New York regulation.