DATE: February 10, 2026
TO: Board of Supervisors
SUBMITTED BY: Joe Prado, Director, Department of Public Health
SUBJECT: Application for a Public Health Crisis Response Cooperative Agreement
RECOMMENDED ACTION(S):
TITLE
Approve and Authorize the Department of Public Health to submit an application for a Public Health Crisis Response Cooperative Agreement to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ($5,000,000).
REPORT
There is no additional Net County Cost associated with the recommended action, which will authorize the Department of Public Health to submit an application for a Public Health Crisis Response Agreement to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). If approved by the CDC, the application will be placed on an approved but unfunded (ABU) list for future emergencies, which enables the CDC to rapidly award emergency response funds to state, local, tribal, and territorial public health agencies. In the past the CDC has used this vehicle to award funds for declared public health emergencies (PHE) resulting from hurricanes, opioids, and COVID-19. This item is countywide.
ALTERNATIVE ACTION(S):
If the Board does not approve the recommended action, the Department will not submit the application and will not be preapproved by the CDC to receive up to $5,000,000 to respond to an eligible public health emergency.
FISCAL IMPACT:
There is no increase in Net County Cost associated with the recommended action. If the CDC approves the application, the subsequent agreement will be brought to your Board for approval following occurrence of an eligible PHE and sufficient appropriations and revenues will be requested in a budget resolution, as needed. There are no match requirements to receive the funding. While the maximum award is $5,000,000, applicants are required to include a budget estimate for 12 months of operations based on real costs from previous responses. The budget submitted with the application is based on actual costs from the Department’s COVID-19 response and totals $53,581,416, which is primarily comprised of increased staffing and contractor costs that would be anticipated in response to a similar scope event in the future.
DISCUSSION:
The CDC’s Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) titled Public Health Crisis Response Cooperative Agreement states that the CDC seeks to enhance the nation’s ability to rapidly mobilize, surge, and respond to PHEs as identified by the CDC by establishing a roster of ABU applications that may receive rapid funding to respond to PHEs of such magnitude, complexity, or significance that they would have an overwhelming impact upon, and exceed resources available to the jurisdictions.
In October 2022, the Board retroactively approved and authorized the Department’s previous submittal of an application for the same Public Health Crisis Response Cooperative Agreement to the CDC. That application was approved by the CDC but was never utilized because an eligible PHE has not occurred since its approval. The 2022 application has expired, and the Department has been invited to resubmit updated application materials to again be preapproved to receive funding to respond to an eligible PHE. Funding available to successful applicants will be a minimum of $50,000 and up to a maximum of $5,000,000.
If the application is approved by the CDC, the Department would be preapproved to receive funding to respond to a PHE which is intended to shorten the time between requesting funding to respond to a PHE and receipt of the funding. However, funding will not be received prior to occurrence of an eligible PHE.
Per the NOFO’s direction, the application describes the Department’s various response activities and estimates 12 months operations costs based on the Department’s real COVID-19 response costs. If approved, the CDC will require the Department to submit revised budget estimates as well as other materials documenting our response actions and proposed outcomes at the time a specific PHE occurs.
ATTACHMENTS INCLUDED AND/OR ON FILE:
On file with Clerk - Application for a Public Health Crisis Response Agreement
CAO ANALYST:
Ronald Alexander