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Ajit Vaidya
vaidya.ajit@epa.gov
Great Lakes National Program Office
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Kinnickinnic River Legacy Act Cleanup

Milwaukee Estuary Area of Concern

The Kinnickinnic River in Milwaukee before contaminated sediment removal.

The Kinnickinnic River in Milwaukee before contaminated sediment removal. (Click to enlarge)

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Great Lakes National Program Office and state partner Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources are celebrated the end of a Great Lakes Legacy Act project that dredged a section of Milwaukee’s Kinnickinnic River in 2009. The Kinnickinnic River project removed around 167,000 cubic yards of sediment contaminated with PCBs and PAHs (polychlorinated biphenyls and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons) between Becher Street and Kinnickinnic Avenue on the south side of Milwaukee. All major field operations are completed.

Federal government and state share costs

Using Great Lakes Legacy Act funds - money set aside by Congress to clean up polluted sediment (mud) along U.S. shores of the Great Lakes -- EPA funded 65 percent or $14.3 million of the $22 million cost of the project. The required nonfederal share of 35 percent or $7.7 million came from a state bond fund under the Governor’s Growing Milwaukee Initiative for sediment cleanup. The special fund was approved by the State Legislature and signed into law by Gov. Jim Doyle in 2007.

The Kinnickinnic River cleanup is the result of many years of collaboration between EPA, Army Corps of Engineers, WDNR, the city and Port of Milwaukee and local stakeholders including Business Improvement District #35.

You will need Adobe Reader to view some of the files on this page. See EPA's PDF page to learn more.

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