KENTUCKY CABINET FOR HEALTH AND FAMILY SERVICES, DEPARTMENT FOR PUBLIC HEALTH RFA-FD-18-001 FLEXIBLE FUNDING MODEL – INFRASTRUCTURE DEVELOPMENT AND MAINTENANCE FOR STATE FOOD REGULATORY PROGRAMS (U 18) SUMMARY The goal of the Kentucky Food Safety Branch is to continue to be an active participant in the nationally integrated food protection system. Chief in accomplishing this goal, as well as the goal of continuing program improvement, is participation in the MFRPS. The five year Cooperative Funding Agreement has allowed our state food protection program to address many of the identified gaps and obstacles, and has allowed our agency to implement a fully-functional MFRPS program in Kentucky. This in turn has allowed our state to achieve and sustain significant to full conformance with the MFRPS. In summary, the intended outcome of the Cooperative Agreement Funding Application is to further advance efforts for a nationally integrated food safety system by utilizing available federal (FDA) funding assistance, thus allowing Kentucky's State Manufactured Food Regulatory Program to continually improve and maintain full conformance with the Manufactured Food Regulatory Program Standards (MFRPS). The MFRPS program funding will be utilized to ensure that Kentucky's manufactured food regulatory programs develop and maintain best practices for a high-quality regulatory program. Full participation in the MFRPS program will assist our federal (FDA) partners in establishing a uniform basis for measuring and improving the performance of manufactured food regulatory programs in the United States.