By KANSAS HEALTH INSTITUTE

TOPEKA — The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation recently awarded the Kansas Health Institute a new grant of just more than $500,000 to continue work involving collaboration among local health departments.

In 2012, KHI was selected to establish and manage the national Center for Sharing Public Health Services with an original grant that ended in September.

The new grant will allow the center to continue its work through June 2015. Additional funding may become available for the center after that time.

The center is led by Gianfranco Pezzino, M.D., M.P.H., a senior fellow and strategy team leader at KHI, and Patrick Libbey, a former local public health official and former executive director of the National Association of County and City Health Officials.

The center’s website features a library of resources and tools for communities.

“KHI was selected for this national initiative, in large part, because of its experience supporting similar work among local health departments in Kansas,” Pezzino said. “In rural states like ours, limited resources often make it challenging to deliver essential public health services. Cross-jurisdictional sharing is one option that local health departments can implement to protect the health and well-being of the public.”

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