Despite budget cuts, San Luis Obispo County’s Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) program is pushing forward, but in a reduced capacity.
The program with 4,760 people on its caseload has plans to increase funding and continue providing care to low-income pregnant, postpartum, and breastfeeding women and their children.
“One in three babies who are born in SLO County are WIC babies,” SLO County Health Promotion Division Manager Jen Miller told the SLO County Board of Supervisors at its Nov. 18 meeting. “Our strategy is to increase caseload to 5,000. If we can do that, we will be entered into the new federal funding tier, which increases the revenue we’re able to bring in.”
Caseload funding adjustment depends on Nutrition Services and Administration grant allocations to the state WIC program. Each local agency is assigned a tier based on certification levels.
SLO County Public Health spokesperson Olivia Montiano told New Times that the local WIC program could move to “Band 3” of funding—a boost of $87,700 in additional base funding per year—if it reaches 5,000 clients.
The SLO County WIC program is trying to increase the number of people it serves by expanding outreach and community partnerships to boost referrals, and by trying to be more accessible.
The National WIC Association is waiting for President Trump to green-light a bill Congress passed recently to end the 43-day government shutdown. The deal, called the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, fully funds WIC for fiscal year 2026, also protecting the program’s fruit and vegetable benefits from proposed cuts.
The local program could receive around $1.8 million through the bill next year. That’s enough money to provide essential services like practical nutrition guidance, nutrition experts, breastfeeding support, health care connections, and monthly WIC food benefits for 6,700 people who are at nutritional risk.
Community members can visit slocounty.gov/WIC to see if they qualify. Call (805) 781-5570 or text (888) 417-6180 to contact the WIC team who also speaks Spanish and has interpretation available for other languages like Mixteco.
While federal dollars mostly fund the local WIC, it doesn’t fully cover operating costs.
“We rely on additional funding from First 5 to strengthen our breastfeeding interventions, which help keep our breastfeeding rates over 20 percent above the state average,” SLO County Public Health spokesperson Montiano said. “We also receive support from the county general fund to ensure we can meet local needs and maintain essential services.”
This summer, local health services like the WIC program bore the brunt of the county’s $38 million budget deficit in the face of inflation and state and federal funding cuts.
The local WIC faced a $150,000 general fund reduction for fiscal year 2025-26. It caused the Paso Robles, Morro Bay, Cambria, and Nipomo clinic sites to shutter. In-person services are now consolidated at the Atascadero, SLO, and Grover Beach locations. Roughly 95 percent of WIC appointments are conducted through telehealth.
County staff noted that an average of three to five families per day, peaking at 13 families on busy days, visit the shuttered Paso Robles site asking for services. Many of these visitors arrived on word-of-mouth referrals, particularly from households with limited English proficiency.
Staff acknowledged that telehealth didn’t fully meet the needs of all participants. The WIC program is now working on partially reopening a “limited presence” at the leased Paso Robles Health Campus at 805 4th St., suite 235, to provide walk-in and in-person appointments for families with high needs.
The program also offers mobile pop-up clinics in the areas impacted by WIC site closures. Serving 30 families over four hours, mobile clinics are one way WIC hopes to up client recruitment.
“The WIC program would like the county to continue its support by maintaining current general fund contributions, advocating for stable federal funding, and helping ensure that WIC remains visible and accessible within the community,” Montiano said. ∆
This article appears in Nov 27 – Dec 7, 2025.