{"id":735650,"date":"2026-06-14T06:18:19","date_gmt":"2026-06-14T06:18:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/735650\/"},"modified":"2026-06-14T06:18:19","modified_gmt":"2026-06-14T06:18:19","slug":"steinbach-council-approves-first-reading-of-400000-loan-for-southeast-event-centre-steinbachonline-com","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/735650\/","title":{"rendered":"Steinbach council approves first reading of $400,000 loan for Southeast Event Centre – SteinbachOnline.com"},"content":{"rendered":"

Steinbach City Council<\/a> has approved first reading of a bylaw that would provide a $400,000 loan to the Southeast Events Group Inc. to support operations at the Southeast Event Centre.<\/p>\n

Council unanimously passed first reading of By-law 2272 during its first regular meeting this month. The proposed loan would provide working capital for the non-profit organization that operates the Southeast Event Centre<\/a> on behalf of the city.<\/p>\n

If ultimately approved, the loan would be funded through the City’s Committed Expenditure Reserve Fund and repaid over approximately four years.<\/p>\n

Additional documents still to come<\/p>\n

Introducing the bylaw, City Manager Troy Warkentin told council the proposal remains a work in progress and additional documents will be presented before council considers final approval.<\/p>\n

He noted the matter has already been discussed at committee.<\/p>\n

Warkentin said further documentation related to the proposed financing arrangement is still being prepared.<\/p>\n

“It is a work in progress,” he told council. “In addition to the proposed bylaw, the city anticipates several further documents to be provided for future consideration by council related to the loan document and process.”<\/p>\n

He explained the bylaw would return to council after those documents are available.<\/p>\n

Related Stories:<\/p>\n

Loan details<\/p>\n

According to the proposed bylaw, the loan would not bear interest and would be repaid in annual installments of $100,000.<\/p>\n

The first payment would be due Sept. 30, 2027, with additional payments due each Sept. 30 until the loan is repaid.<\/p>\n

The bylaw also states loan repayments must take priority over allocations of working capital, surpluses, profits or revenues.<\/p>\n

To protect the city’s interests, council is also proposing security agreements and a promissory note as part of the lending arrangement.<\/p>\n

Growing pains acknowledged<\/p>\n

Councillor Damian Penner, who moved first reading of the bylaw, said the event centre experienced some expected challenges during its first year of operation.<\/p>\n

“As administration said that there’s going to be more information, so I won’t get into the details too deep, but as the event center had presented to us in committee, there were some growing pains opening up, and that’s to be expected when you have a facility of that size.”<\/p>\n

Penner noted there are few comparable facilities available to use as benchmarks.<\/p>\n

He said those challenges are understandable when they are acknowledged and addressed.<\/p>\n

“So growing pains are not excusable, but at the same time are sometimes understood that if they are addressed and acknowledged as to why they came up, then that makes sense.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

Loan, not a grant<\/p>\n

Penner emphasized the proposed funding is a loan that must be repaid, not a grant.<\/p>\n

He pointed to provisions within the bylaw that prioritize repayment before surplus funds can be allocated elsewhere.<\/p>\n

“So this is coming back to the city to be out of the revenue surplus that the event center will be pulling in the near future.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

Confidence in year two<\/p>\n

Councillor Bill Hiebert also supported the bylaw and said the facility’s financial outlook appears to be improving.<\/p>\n

“I just want to add that year #2 is already looking a lot better for the event center.”<\/p>\n

Hiebert said the proposed repayment timeline is reasonable.<\/p>\n

“To have this loan repaid in four years, I think is very appropriate.”<\/p>\n

Related Stories:<\/p>\n

Next steps<\/p>\n

Crews broke ground on the Southeast Event Centre in January 2023 and the grand opening took place in August\u00a02025. It serves as a regional facility for sports, recreation, entertainment and community events.<\/p>\n

Before the proposed loan can be finalized, council must still approve second and third readings of the bylaw. Additional loan and security documents are also expected to be presented for council’s review.<\/p>\n

Council ultimately voted unanimously in favour of first reading.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Steinbach City Council has approved first reading of a bylaw that would provide a $400,000 loan to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":735651,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[45,49,48],"class_list":["post-735650","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-ca","tag-canada"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735650","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=735650"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735650\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/735651"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=735650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=735650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=735650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}