The Manitoba government is nearly doubling funding for the Franco-Manitoban Cultural Centre, Premier Wab Kinew announced at the centre in St. Boniface on Friday.
The annual funding for the cultural centre will increase $387,000, from $419,000 to $806,000, Kinew said at the news conference, where he spoke mostly in French.
Annual funding for the cultural centre, commonly known by the French abbreviation CCFM, has been frozen at $419,000 since 2011, the province said.
“Wow. Wow wow,” CCFM board president Michelle Gervais said at the news conference. “We are ecstatic.”
CCFM executive director Ginette Lavack said the funds will help stabilize the centre’s finances, which have been hurt by inflation and the pandemic, with people slowly returning to events.
“We’ve been posting deficit budgets for the last number of years,” she said. “These new funds essentially will help balance our budgets.”
The money also will allow the centre to complete repairs more quickly, she said.
“We can breathe a little more easily.”
Facilities at the CCFM include two theatres, a multipurpose hall, a restaurant, offices and classrooms.
It’s home to the St. Boniface Historical Society’s heritage centre, Manitoba’s French youth organization, Franco-Manitoban theatre Cercle Molière, a French-language publisher, a French radio station, music organizations and other francophone groups.