Steinbach Family Resource Centre cuts program after Manitoba denies funding ask

Steinbach Family Resource Centre is facing cuts to its nutritional and chronic disease programming, citing rising wages and operating costs, after the Manitoba government rejected its request for funding.

The non-profit, located on 101 North Front Dr., previously offered the only free registered dietitian service for young families in the Southeast. Now, the centre will cut its registered dietitian position, ending its chronic disease referrals and stopping all pediatric and prenatal dietitian consults because it can’t afford to maintain the programming.

When executive director Jo-Anne Dalton received the funding denial letter on April 2, she re-read the email at least 18 times, certain the province made a mistake.

“It was like air was let out of our balloon,” she told The Carillon.

While the non-profit gets funding through Manitoba grants, it has never received direct provincial dollars. The federal government has given $163,000 annually since 2000, but there has been little increase, she said.

Dalton said the centre submitted a funding proposal in July 2025 after having consultations with the Department of Families and then resubmitted the ask for roughly $200,000 annually for five years in February.

“We are at the very start of a fiscal year, and we’ve just lost a significant chunk of our budget,” she said, as the centre has already planned to run a deficit due to hiring a new program manager in January.

The same week the department denied the funding proposal, Child Family Services, who previously rented office space from the centre, ended its lease, triggering a further loss of $25,000 annually.

The impact of the dietitian position cut extends to the centre’s breast-feeding group, special delivery pregnancy group, and postpartum program. Dalton said less expert advice and resources will be available for mothers and families in need.

The centre helps roughly 700 families every year from at least 50 different communities in the Southeast, including Winnipeg.

The dietitian performed 107 nutritional consults, which address issues such as weight gain or feeding, for families in 2024-2025, according to the centre’s annual report.

Dalton said Southern Health had previously referred patients to the centre for its programming because it was the only free resource and registered prenatal dietitian in the region.

A spokesperson for Southern Health confirmed in an email statement to The Carillon that it doesn’t have a prenatal dietitian on staff. While it does have general dietitian services, the wait time for services under the chronic disease program can be up to six weeks.

“It has been a very, very long process for us in terms of realizing that there is a need, and we cannot continue to meet this need, because we cannot afford to,” Dalton said.

With the registered dietitian position gone, families are left with either enduring the wait times or paying out of pocket for a private dietitian, which many of the families the centre helped couldn’t afford, she said.

The provincial 2026 budget also didn’t include any southeastern Manitoba-specific funding from the Department of Families, instead offering funding for prenatal and postnatal services at Winnipeg-based charity Villa Rosa, which also provides programming for mothers and babies, and supporting the new Mino’Ayaawag Ikwewag Mothering Centre in the city. The budget also added more lactation consultants in the Interlake-Eastern Regional Health Authority.

Prior to the budget announcement, the province announced in February it would up United Way Winnipeg’s funding for family support programming by $500,000, bringing the annual contribution to $2 million.

Dalton said she had conversations with United Way Winnipeg to have rural programming, but the answer was no because of extra costs. She was hopeful there would be an opportunity for provincial funding in the Southeast because there is nothing in the budget. But the proposal rejection added extra disappointment.

“These are disheartening conversations that we’re having because nobody is thinking outside of those borders. We have so many small, rural, isolated communities, which means isolated families with lack of transportation, with lack of access to programming and supports that are now only available in urban centres,” Dalton said.

Families Minister Nahanni Fontaine said there were no cuts to the centre’s funding made by her department, but said the department has never funded the programming before.

“I’m sure you must recognize, how many proposals we get as government and in each of our departments that are not funded,” she told The Carillon. “Government doesn’t have an infinite amount of dollars to be able to fund every proposal.”

Fontaine said the centre received $103,000 through the parent child coalition, a network of organizations that offers programming for children ages up to six-years-old. She also mentioned that $30 million dollars from her department goes to support organizations in the Southeast, including Steinbach Family Resource Centre.

The investments in other regions are made to support Manitobans across the province, Fontaine said.

Dalton disputed those figures. While the centre did receive the $103,000, it’s role was to administer the funds to other organizations and only saw $5,000 through a grant from it. She also said the centre has never received any money from the $30 million touted by Fontaine.

Progressive Conservative families critic Jodie Byram said the provincial government is forgetting about rural Manitobans and how the lack of funding impacts residents. She echoed concerns that the cuts made to Steinbach Family Resource Centre’s programming will download people onto health care services, pushing wait times higher and adding further strain to staff.

“It’s just taking from one situation and pushing it onto another burdened stream,” Byram said.

The lack of provincial funding commitments to rural areas, such as the resource centre, hampers the effectiveness of Manitoba’s poverty reduction strategy, she said.

The five-year strategy, released on Jan. 13, targeted children under five, youth exiting the child welfare system and seniors as vulnerable populations. The Carillon previously reported local charities in Steinbach, such as Pat Porter Active Living Centre and Steinbach Community Outreach, raised concerns that there weren’t enough rural-specific measures included.

Fontaine said at the time provinice-wide consultations were used to inform the strategy and its measures are meant to help everyone.

Byram said the decision could be politically motivated with the NDP wanting to concentrate funding in urban areas where they know votes can be won rather than sending dollars to Steinbach ahead of a provincial election. The next election must happen by Oct. 5, 2027.

“I know the community is a strong community, and they can pull together and help one another,” she said.

“Unfortunately, the NDP aren’t there to see the value that this center provides the community.”