The Pat Porter Active Living Centre in Steinbach is planning for a tough year financially. 

At the centre's annual general meeting, Executive Director Audrey Harder reported the past year was full of ups and downs. 

“Thankfully, we’ve been able to secure grants, that's helped us through the year,” she says. “But we've also noticed expenses going up as everything goes up right now. So, we're struggling a little bit with that.” 

With costs climbing for everything these days, Harder expects the centre will have to do a lot of extra fundraising this year to offset those increases. 

And she is optimistic that the numbers will work out. 

Looking at the financial report from this past year, fundraising income had increased from $3,902 in 2021 to $25, 562 in 2022. 

At Thursday’s meeting, Harder also reported a steady climb in membership. 

“We’re definitely seeing an increase in membership,” she says. “With my first full year here, we had just under 400 members and then the pandemic hit, and we were hitting almost 200. And now we're up to over 300 again. And this week alone there were three more so it's a continuous growth.” 

There was also a significant increase in the number of members who attended the AGM on Thursday, Harder says. With close to 100 people at the meeting, she says it is by far the biggest turnout for the annual event. 

As far as the financial statement goes, there are some concerning numbers as well as positives that can be seen. 

Last year saw revenues down by $4,933 compared to the previous year, while expenses were up by $44,952 in 2022. 

Yet the centre has ended the year with a revenue of $12,828. 

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