To find a restaurant inspection in Madison or Dane County, use the official Public Health Madison & Dane County inspection search. Enter all or part of the establishment name, match the street address and establishment type, then open the facility’s dated history. Dane County does not assign a score or grade. The useful comparison is between the inspection type, result, Priority findings, all violations, corrections, and any later reinspection.
Search the custom portal by establishment name
The public search accepts an establishment name rather than a street address or inspection date. A partial name works, so start with the most distinctive words and shorten the query if the full name returns nothing. Results show the Establishment Name, Address, and Establishment Type. Confirm all three before opening a record, especially when a brand has multiple locations or a business has changed names.
The facility page then lists its inspection history with three fields: Inspection Type, Inspection Date, and Inspection Result. Choose the date that answers your question. A Routine Inspection and a Reinspection are separate events, even when they appear in the same facility history.
Public Health Madison & Dane County says its food-establishment reports cover restaurants, grocery stores, delis, convenience stores, bars, workplace cafeterias, coffee shops, ice cream shops, catering kitchens, and private organizations serving the public. Permanent, mobile, and seasonal operations can be included. Use the establishment type shown in the search result rather than assuming every food record is a conventional restaurant.
The portal requires session cookies. If it returns an error about cookies, allow them for the official site and reopen the search page. That error does not establish that an establishment lacks inspection records.
Switch between Priority findings and the complete report
An individual inspection report offers two views: Show Priority (CDC Risk Factor) Violations and Show All Violations. The Priority view helps isolate findings that can directly affect foodborne-illness risk. It is not the complete inspection. Switch to the all-violations view before concluding what the report contains.
The report gives the inspector’s observation and the corrective action for each displayed finding. It can also identify a Repeat Violation and whether an item was Corrected Onsite. Read those fields together:
| Report field | What it answers | What it does not establish |
|---|---|---|
| Priority-only view | Which displayed findings are treated as CDC risk factors | The complete number or range of findings |
| All-violations view | The broader set of findings recorded for that inspection | A numeric score or letter grade |
| Repeat Violation | The finding was documented on an earlier routine inspection report | That conditions stayed unchanged between visits |
| Corrected Onsite | The cited issue was corrected during that inspection | Conditions after the inspector left |
The agency advises readers to focus on the type of violation rather than the count. Its inspection-report guide explains that Priority violations require immediate correction or correction within a few days, while Core violations generally concern cleaning and maintenance. For more help separating an observation from its correction and verification, see the site’s violation-reading guide.
What changed when we selected All Violations
In an AI-assisted remote lookup on October 4, 2026, we entered Culver in the official name search and selected Culver’s, 4910 County Highway V, DeForest, WI 53532, listed as Primarily Restaurant. We opened two dated Routine Inspection reports and selected both violation views. This was a public-record check, not a visit to the restaurant.
| Routine report | Priority view | All Violations view | What the extra view revealed |
|---|---|---|---|
| May 3, 2023 | 2 findings | 3 findings | A plumbing-repair item absent from the Priority view |
| February 6, 2025 | 2 findings | 2 findings | The same two findings in both views |
The 2023 Priority view showed handwashing and hot-holding findings, both marked Corrected Onsite: Yes. Selecting Show All Violations added Good Repair—Plumbing: a nonworking wash-basin plug at the three-compartment sink. That item was marked Corrected Onsite: No. Yet the facility history’s result for this routine visit was No Reinspection Required. The result label therefore did not mean every item had been corrected during the visit.
The February 2025 report showed sanitizer-concentration and chemical-labeling findings, both marked corrected onsite. Its result was also No Reinspection Required. These were two routine visits, not an established original-inspection/reinspection pair. The later report did not establish when the 2023 plumbing issue was fixed, and we did not verify continuous ownership or conditions between visits.
To reproduce the comparison, start at the official search, use the partial name above, match the full address, and open each date. The report pages use the portal session, so a copied report-page address alone may not preserve the selected facility or date. Record the selected view as well as the count. The difference between two and three findings is a filter difference, not a grade or a measure of present safety.
Follow the correction clock into the next visit
A Routine result with violations does not tell you whether a later check occurred. Open the facility history and look for the next Reinspection, then compare the dates and findings rather than treating the first report as the last word.
PHMDC’s May 2025 Retail Food Re-Inspections guide says an inspection may require a follow-up reinspection for one or more of these reasons:
- Priority violations;
- more than ten total violations;
- repeat violations from earlier inspections; or
- major additional good-retail-practice violations.
Those are possible triggers, not a score formula. The same guide says Priority violations must be corrected immediately, on the inspection date. Additional good-retail-practice violations are usually given seven days, while structural building violations are generally given 30 days. An operator who cannot meet a compliance date for a valid reason must request an extension from the inspector before that date.
The first reinspection may not end the sequence. The county says another reinspection is required when any Priority violation remains uncorrected or when at least 50% of the total violations remain uncorrected. If multiple reinspections still leave Priority violations or many total violations unresolved, progressive enforcement may include license suspension and possible revocation.
Keep each object on its own line: the original inspection, each compliance date, an approved extension if one exists, each reinspection, and any later licensing action. A reinspection requirement is not itself a closure order. A suspension or revocation possibility is not proof that either action occurred. The site’s reinspection and follow-up guide explains how to preserve the trigger and later outcome as separate events.
Check the regulator when the operation is mobile or temporary
PHMDC’s food-establishment page says all Dane County food establishments must be licensed and inspected each year, but it also documents regulator and licensing exceptions that affect how a record should be read.
A mobile vendor with a current Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection state mobile license is exempt from an additional PHMDC license when operating across multiple cities and counties. The vendor may still be inspected by PHMDC and may owe the stated inspection fee. A mobile operation working only in Dane County instead needs the local annual mobile license. For transient events at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, the county page directs licensing questions to UW Environmental Health & Safety.
That boundary matters when a name search is blank. Confirm the operation type, the address or event location, and the license issuer before concluding that the county should have a restaurant history under the name you entered.
Request the dated record when the online history is incomplete
The reviewed official pages do not publish one universal earliest date for every online food-establishment history. Do not turn the oldest date visible for one establishment into a countywide retention rule.
PHMDC’s open-records page tells readers to check the public inspection data before requesting licensed-establishment records. It also says archived paper records are available for inspection during stated business hours. For an unexplained gap, identify the establishment name, full address, establishment type, approximate inspection date, and the specific document needed, such as a routine report, reinspection, suspension order, or later authorization to resume operation. The page lists PHOpenRecords@publichealthmdc.com and 608-266-4821 for records requests.
A report describes conditions observed on its inspection date. It may not reflect later corrections or the establishment’s current condition. Preserve the report date, visit type, result, violation view, and any later action instead of using one old finding or an empty search as a present-status conclusion.
Official sources and portal behavior checked October 4, 2026.