TURNERS FALLS — After Channel 22 News reported an alleged food poisoning case at Franklin County Tech School, the school has reviewed their kitchen policies and had a positive inspection conducted by the Board of Health.

According to Franklin County Tech School Superintendent Rick Martin, a parent of a student called at the end of the school day on Feb. 6 to report that the student said they got sick after eating undercooked baked chicken on Feb. 5. There was no confirmed case of foodborne illness by a doctor.

The student who claimed to be ill posted a picture of the chicken on Facebook, leading Channel 22 News to write their report on Feb. 8. The article said that two students reported becoming sick, but Martin said that only one parent called to report illness.

“The report identified on Channel 22 news had some inaccuracies,” Martin said.

Martin said that on Feb. 5, 142 chicken dinners were served. According to Martin, cafeteria staff checks the temperature of the chicken when it’s taken out of the oven, and logs for that day showed that the chicken was taken out at 170 degrees, five degrees above the minimum threshold temperature required.

Since the following Wednesday was a snow day, the school’s investigation began on Thursday. Martin met with the cafeteria director who reviewed the logs and verified the temperature documentation.

FCTS called the Board of Health to conduct an inspection, which was completed Monday.

“All I can tell you is that we served 142 chicken dinners and no one reported to be sick until that one student called in,” said Martin. “There was no other incident reported like (Channel) 22 reported.”

According to Martin, the student was back in school on Thursday.

Director of Public Health Gina McNeely confirmed that temperature logs were taken when the chicken was taken out of the oven.

“One would expect if this chicken was undercooked, then we would have had a confirmed foodborne illness (report) from a doctor’s office,” McNeely said.

According to McNeely, the parent who called the school said the only symptom her child had was vomiting.

McNeely also mentioned that the pictures of the school’s chicken displayed on 22 News looked like dark meat, which has a deeper color due to the muscle.

“Exercised muscles have a darker color due to the oxyhemoglobin,” she said.

The Health Department performed routine inspections on Sept. 13 and Nov. 14 of last year. According to McNeely, the reports were “pretty positive” and any issues seemed to be unrelated to a potential foodborne illness problem.

Some of the issues included dusty freezer fans and unlabeled shepherd’s pie.

McNeely said that if the reported illness was foodborne, the school “would have had more calls.” With an issue such as food poisoning, the health department expects a larger number of people affected.

“If we had a positive lab (result), we would have had a different investigation,” McNeely said. “We’ve heard generally positive reviews of the food at the tech school.”