The Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago (MWRD) will kick off Black History Month with the sixth annual Pan-African flag raising ceremony at the Barbara J. McGowan Main Office Building and at all seven of the MWRD’s water reclamation plants on Monday, Feb. 2, 2026, at 10 a.m.

Board meetings are open to the public and can be streamed online.

How and why the flow of the Chicago River was reversed

During their meeting, Durbin and President Steele spoke about securing federal reimbursement from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for construction of the reservoir.

The reservoir has a capacity of 7.9 billion gallons and is connected to Chicago's Deep Tunnel network to prevent flooding — both in the form of basement backups and in the form of overflow of the banks of Thorn Creek.

The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, which is now overseeing the site, observed asphalt in the canal and along the shoreline after the cleanup was reported complete, said IEPA spokesperson Kim Biggs in a statement last week.