Fort St. John and Dawson Creek child development non-profits awarded nearly $240K for capital projects

FORT ST. JOHN, B.C. — Two organizations in northern B.C. have been named as recipients of capital projects grants.

The Child Development Centre (CDC) in Fort St. John and the South Peace Child Development Centre in Dawson Creek each received grants from the B.C. Ministry of Tourism, Arts, Culture and Sports. 

The Child Development Centre will receive $194,500 and the South Peace Child Development Centre will get $44,634.

The B.C. government says the grants will help the non-profits to continue to provide accessible skills programs to children with significant support needs.

The grants were announced on March 20th, 2026. 

Anne Kang, minister of tourism, arts, culture and sports, says the grants are meant to help non-profit organizations with a number of costs.

“These Community Gaming Grants will help non-profits make a variety of costs,” Kang said. “Such as upgrading infrastructure, investing in technology services and improving transportation.” 

In a recent conversation with Energeticcity.ca, Tana Millner, executive director at the CDC in Fort St. John, said funding was one of the barriers facing families seeking autism services.

Millner says the centre had applied for the grant last year and the money from the grant is going towards expanding services.

“It’s going towards our capital campaign,” Millner said. “That is the Nelson House purchase and renovation, which is currently happening.

“Right now, it’s going to be our special services program that goes in there, so that provides services for respite and life skills. There will also be autism programming happening out of there, so it allows us to increase space and provide additional services for those programs.”

The Nelson House will be adjacent to the current CDC location in Fort St. John. 

According to the CDC’s website, the goal of the capital campaign is to raise $500,000 to be used to purchase and renovate Nelson House.

CDC recently held a talent show, which raised $100,000 towards the capital project. 

More information on this year’s recipients, as well as past recipients, can be found on the British Columbia government website.