Milwaukee Wins $275 Million Grant To Fund Massive Waterway Cleanup

The Environmental Protection Agency’s Lake Guardian vessel at Discovery World. Photo by Jeramey Jannene.

A massive environmental cleanup project of Milwaukee’s waterways reached a pivotal milestone Thursday. Officials from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) joined local partners to announce a $275 million federal grant that will back the $450 million effort.

“This is the largest cleanup project ever under the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative,” said EPA Administrator Michael Regan in making the announcement at Discovery World. “By cleaning up those treasured waters, we will significantly improve the health of the Milwaukee area, create good paying jobs and contribute to the revitalization of communities right here in Wisconsin.”

The effort, which will proceed in phases through 2029, will clean up more than a century of environmental contamination. The plan calls for cleaning Milwaukee’s waterways sufficient enough to see the federal “area of concern” designation dropped, with the result that fish would be safer to eat and water safer to swim in. The designation was first applied to Milwaukee’s harbor and connecting rivers in 1987.

“The Milwaukee estuary has long been identified as one of the most polluted areas in the country,” said Regan. “Cleanup and restoration is essential to the health of the surrounding communities, the vitality of Lake Michigan and the strength of local economies.”

“Our waterways are sadly degraded by a history of neglect, or ignorance. The legacy of industrial misuse of the Milwaukee River, the Menomonee River and Milwaukee’s Inner Harbor impairs our ability to fully enjoy our waterways here in in Milwaukee,” said Mayor Cavalier Johnson.

Five local partners, the City of Milwaukee, Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, Milwaukee County, We Energies and Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District, will contribute approximately $170 million in matching funding through direct allocations and in-kind support. Much of that local funding will cover the cost to build the Dredged Material Management Facility (DMMF), a 42-acre storage facility for the removed sediment. After several decades, the DMMF could be used as a park or part of the Port of Milwaukee.

“We will advance this work in ways that none of us could have done individually,” said DNR Secretary Adam Payne. “This is something special.”

“The Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) has been transformational in our fight to protect and restore our greatest freshwater resources,” said U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin. The federal GLRI was created in 2009 to support cleanup the lakes. “One independent economic study found that for every dollar the [GLRI] invests it produces an additional $3.35 of economic activity.

The first visible component of the Milwaukee project actually took place last summer. We Energies recently concluded a dredging project of the Milwaukee River near the Historic Third Ward. Sediment went into an existing sediment facility, which is nearly full.

Construction on the DMMF, to be located near the southeastern corner of the Hoan Bridge, will start next year and take approximately two years to complete. Starting in 2026, an EPA-led dredging project will begin. In total, the cleanup initiative is expected to involve the removal of two million cubic yards of sediment, which Regan compared to 610 Olympic-sized pools.

The Milwaukee Estuary Area of Concern encompasses the Inner Harbor and portions of the Milwaukee, Menomonee and Kinnickinnic rivers. The area is roughly bounded by E. North Ave. to the north, W. Cleveland Ave. to the south, Lake Michigan to the east and N. 35th St. to the west. An expanded area of concern designated in 2008 includes the Milwaukee River to Cedarburg, the Little Menomonee River almost to the Mequon border, and the Kinnickinnic River to Greenfield.

There were initially five Areas of Concern in Wisconsin and 43 designated Areas of Concern in the Great Lakes, including 17 in Canada and seven shared by the U.S. and Canada. Nine of the areas have been successfully delisted.

The Milwaukee partners working on the project. Known as the Waterway Restoration Partnership, the initiative was announced in January 2020. City officials said since the 2020 announcement, partners have worked to solidify included projects, advance early efforts and secure the formal EPA commitment.

“While today we celebrate, tomorrow the hard work begins,” said MMSD Executive Director Kevin Shafer. And in many ways, it already has.

A number of projects are at various stages of development, including the Grand Trunk site wetland restoration, a project to fill the Burnham Canal so it functions as a wetland, a habitat restoration project in the Little Menomonee River, a fish passage and cleanup at the Kletzsch Park Dam in Glendale and an effort to clean a sewer laden with PCBs from a contaminated plant in Riverwest.

Baldwin noted she secured the Burnham Canal funding in 2014. “Some might say I was fighting for clean water before it was fashionable,” she noted, but pivoting to note her senate colleague Ron Johnson wasn’t present. “I am also proud to be one the senator from Wisconsin to support the single biggest investment to address Wisconsin’s four Areas of Concern.”

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