Montgomery County Council Member Duchy Trachtenberg wants to ban trans fats in county restaurants.
“There is compelling evidence that the consumption of artificial trans fats is linked directly to the high prevalence of heart disease and obesity,” Trachtenberg told The Examiner on Wednesday. “The fact that we can legislate such a regulation to control that intake is really just common sense.”
On Tuesday, Trachtenberg will introduce her legislation that requires Montgomery County restaurants to eliminate trans fats by Jan. 1, 2008.
If her legislation passes, and she expects it will, Trachtenberg said Montgomery would become the first county in the nation to take such action. New York City’s Board of Health passed a similar ban last December.
“I think it will have a positive impact on the restaurant business in Montgomery County,” Trachtenberg said of her bill. “I think it will improve business.”
Maureen Storey, Director of the Center for Food, Nutrition and Agriculture Policy at the University of Maryland, College Park, said trans fats are linked to raising bad cholesterol and slightly lowering good cholesterol. Despite the connection, Storey said, it’s “not a good idea to summarily ban trans fat.”
“Too often the easy fix is to use a fat that is high in saturated fat, thus not improving diet at all,” Storey said.
Cutting trans fats is particularly difficult in baked goods, Storey said.
“Because trans fat, which is a harder fat, also have important functions in the final product in addition to taste,” she said.
But Trachtenberg, a public health professional, doesn’t think restaurants would turn to saturated fats.
“There are a number of healthy alternatives,” she said.
Some restaurants in the community, such as the Silver Diner in Rockville, already have eliminated trans fats from their food. Silver Diner Kitchen Manager Sam Jackson said the diner now uses soybean oil.
“It is a little more expensive,” he said. “But we made the decision as a company to do that.”
Jackson said the Rockville location made the change in September, and all of chain’s restaurants in Maryland, Virginia and New Jersey switched by January.
