A handful of local pizzerias continue to litter hotels with fliers targeting tourists with low-quality and sometimes sickening food six months after the unscrupulous practice was uncovered in a San Antonio Express-News investigation, hotel managers say.

The delivery problems, which are common elsewhere and have plagued local hotels for more than 20 years, are likely to surge during Memorial Day weekend and the summer tourist season, the managers said.

“Summer is upon us. These guys are pretty slick. ... They know when occupancies are high,” said Dusty Smith, general manager of the downtown Residence Inn by Marriott, who recently put magnets on the inside of his hotel room doors to warn guests not to order from the restaurants. “For being so slimy, they’re pretty savvy.”

Known offenders continue to receive scathing reviews on Yelp and other websites from tourists complaining of rotten and uncooked food, rude employees and food that was never delivered.

One of the restaurants in question, The Pizza Experts Pizzeria at 7708 Marbach Road, has especially bad reviews. All of the 26 Yelp reviews it has received since December have been one-star. Customers describe its pizza as cold, burnt, uncooked, and covered with raw meat toppings. The restaurant didn’t answer calls Friday afternoon.

“Do yourself a favor and eat razor blades and cyanide before you attempt this place,” one Yelp reviewer, Wade K. of San Angelo, wrote about The Pizza Experts in January. “I’ve eaten bark off a tree that was more nutritious. My order was wrong, cold, late and absolute garbage. Think this review is harsh? Try eating their food.”

Over the years, hotels have fought back by suing restaurant owners and persuading the City Council to pass an ordinance making it illegal to distribute fliers on private property when told not to do so. Restaurants’ employees who slip into hotels pose a security threat to guests, hotel managers said.

“They’re still out there. They’re like roaches — they’re not going away,” said Bill Petrella, president of the San Antonio Hotel & Lodging Association and general manager of the Westin Riverwalk. Some of the restaurants’ employees were caught sneaking into the Westin on Thursday, he said.

The Metropolitan Health District hasn’t inspected The Pizza Experts since Dec. 18, when an inspector noticed an employee eating on a food preparation area and then putting ingredients into containers without washing his hands, according to city records. There were no paper towels and soap at the hand-washing sink.

Before that inspection, which was conducted after the Express-News questioned the Health District about the restaurant, The Pizza Experts went more than a year and a half without a routine inspection. Pizzerias typically receive routine inspections about every six months, according to the district.

Some restaurants have received health code violations since the Express-News story ran in December. Angelo’s Pizza & Subs on Austin Highway, a restaurant that was cited a year ago after a baby’s diaper was changed in the kitchen, still didn’t have hand towels during its inspection this month — a problem for which it has been cited five times since 2013. The restaurant was also docked for storing food at improper temperatures, but it passed with a score of 95 out of 100.

The owner of Angelo’s, Ruslana Rodriguez, said the restaurant doesn’t send employees to sneak into hotels anymore. “It doesn’t seem to work anymore. It’s just wasting time,” she said.

She said her restaurant recently signed a contract with a company that makes legitimate deals with hotels to distribute her menus. The restaurant is still struggling to improve its reputation, which was ruined by previous owners who followed unscrupulous business practices, she said. That’s part of the reason it continues to get bad reviews, she said.

“Whoever’s happy, they don’t write a review,” Rodriguez said. “If you do something the same way every time, there will be people who absolutely love it, and people who absolutely hate it.”

Other restaurants accused by hotels and customers of ripping them off include The Slice on West U.S. 90 and Il Villaggio Italiano Pizzeria on Hillcrest Drive. Calls to those restaurants weren’t returned Friday.

In the past, the businesses have disguised themselves by changing their names and phone numbers. One pizzeria operating out of a storefront at Marbach Road also had the name Il Villaggio on the door in December but was distributing fliers under the name The Pizza Experts. It appears to be using a new phone number on some review websites.

“This place had the worst pizza ever in my life and at 60 I’ve had a lot,” another Yelp user, James S. of Denver, wrote about The Pizza Experts in January. “It took over an hour and it was under-cooked and ice cold. When I complained and asked for a hot one I was told it would be here in an hour but they never showed.”

Il Villaggio on Hillcrest Drive also hasn’t been inspected since the story ran in December. The restaurant has received several disturbing inspections in the past few years, and it had its food establishment license suspended in October when an inspector saw that its employees weren’t washing their hands and that it was infested with roaches. Its license was reinstated a month later, but the inspector noted it still had roaches.

The Express-News investigation discovered that all the restaurants under scrutiny are connected in one way or another with Michael Yetter, who entered the local pizza business in the early 1980s after leaving the Army in Killeen. Yetter, who has since retired in Michigan, was sued by hotel chains several times in the 1990s and 2000s.

Yetter admitted to the Express-News that he put fliers in hotels after opening his own shop around 1989 at Broadway and Mulberry Avenue, but he says he had permission. The problems came from the people he leased his businesses to, who went “haywire,” he said.

“They were a little unscrupulous. It took me a while to find out that things are going on, of course,” Yetter told the Express-News last year. “I’m about 10 percent responsible for some of the stuff going on. I can’t say I’m 100 percent not responsible.”

rwebner@express-news.net

@rwebner