Brian Pohrte got into kayaking after the COVID-19 pandemic.
A longtime St. Charles resident, he had started out biking with his family as a way to get outdoors, but then decided to try his hand at paddling.
“We’ve got the Fox River right there,” Pohrte, 42, said. “I’d go over the river every day, and it’s like, ‘Man …that’s a great resource we have. … I should try that out.’”
He soon joined the St. Charles Canoe Club, a “kayaking for fitness club” that runs the gamut of water-oriented paddle sports, and has since become a regular on the river.
But this natural resource he’s come to rely on for exercise and recreation has weathered some uncertainty in recent years, as the state and federal government have looked at removing a number of the Fox River’s dams in the western suburbs of Chicago.
Recently, the river has been the subject of intensive study by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which has been evaluating the possibility of removing some of the Fox River dams.
Dams have become the subject of removal for numerous reasons, among them benefits to public safety, improved water quality and a better habitat for wildlife.
But, at least in the Fox’s case, that suggestion has also been met with opposition, on the grounds that removal would negatively affect recreational use of the river and impact property owners and the cities along the waterway, among other reasons.
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An initial recommendation by the Army Corps in 2023 to tear some of the dams down was met with community backlash. It eventually went back to the drawing board, with plans to study the issue again and report back.
But now, that study’s been paused for review by the federal government, leaving residents and local officials alike to continue to wait, while some forge ahead with their own vision for their community’s dams.
The history of the Fox River dams
The dams in question dot the Fox River from Elgin to South Elgin, St. Charles, Geneva, Batavia, North Aurora, Aurora and Montgomery.
Most were built in the 1800s to run flour mills or sawmills that have long since closed. Such low-head dams, which let water flow over the top, create a dangerous backwash that can suck victims underwater, causing drownings and near-fatal accidents.
As a result, the Illinois Department of Natural Resources in recent years has removed about 30 dams on rivers throughout the state, including the Fox River’s Carpentersville dam, which was torn down in 2024 via an agreement with the Kane County Forest Preserve District.
The dam removal push is part of a nationwide movement to restore free-flowing rivers. Studies generally have shown that removing dams improves water quality and increases the number and diversity of fish.
Under a directive from Congress to clean up rivers, the Army Corps of Engineers examined a number of dam-related measures to improve water quality in the Fox River — including rock ramps, bypass channels, partial removals and leaving the dams as they are.
In 2023, the corps tentatively recommended the full removal of nine dams along the river — including the Carpentersville dam, which has since been torn down — as the only way to improve water quality and restore habitat, while requiring little to no maintenance costs. Dams in Algonquin and McHenry would remain under the proposed plan, keeping the north end of the river and Chain of Lakes intact for powerboating.
Removing the dams is expected to lower water levels significantly, which would likely make parts of the waterway impassible for large motorboats, pitting boaters against kayakers. But it would achieve part of the federal government’s goal of improving water quality and the amount and diversity of habitat for fish, mussels and other aquatic life, according to the Army Corps.
The 2023 study projected removing the nine Fox River dams costing a little under $16 million. The Army Corps would pay up to 65% of the cost of each dam removal on the Fox, with the state expected to pay the rest. If municipalities oppose removal, they would be expected to take over ownership, maintenance and liability for their dams.
The Illinois Department of Natural Resources is interested in dam removal primarily for public safety reasons, an IDNR spokesman told The Beacon-News, but is also interested in purposes like water quality benefits, fish passage, boat passage, reduced sediment build-up and reduced maintenance costs. Of the dams in question, the state currently owns six — in South Elgin, St. Charles, Geneva, North Aurora, Montgomery and Aurora, the spokesman confirmed.
But residents who want to keep their municipalities’ dams have pushed back against the Army Corps plan in recent years, with local groups cropping up in places like St. Charles and South Elgin.
The city of St. Charles, meanwhile, created a task force to help gather additional information for the city as it decides whether or not to remove the dam there.
And local officials, for their part, have raised concerns about how removal would affect things like drinking water, sewage treatment and recreation.
The Army Corps ultimately agreed to do further analysis on the impact of dam removal, including how it would affect water levels and what sediments might be released.
Federal study on pause
Now, in addition to the local backlash and further study, removal of the Fox River’s dams faces a new hold-up: delays from the federal government.
Asked about the status of the Fox River study, a spokesman from the corps’ Chicago District recently confirmed that the study is still in the “Feasibility Study Phase.”
“Our nation’s aging infrastructure requires significant investment, with numerous critical programs, projects and activities regularly being evaluated for funding with limited federal resources,” the Army Corps spokesman said in a statement provided to The Beacon-News. “We are focused on strategically allocating available resources to prioritize the most pressing infrastructure needs across the country.”
In response to multiple requests for comment, the Army Corps did not provide further details on the timeline for the study.
Emails obtained by The Beacon-News, however, reveal that the project was paused months ago.
An email from October, for example, from an Army Corps official to St. Charles City Administrator Heather McGuire, said that “all activities associated with this study (were) paused due to the lapse in appropriations.”
A January email from the corps to McGuire indicates that the project was “paused while under Senior Administrative Review.” A January email from the corps’ Chicago District to Batavia City Administrator Laura Newman says the same.
Officials had planned to make a final decision on most of the dams in 2025, but that deadline has since come and gone.
The Fox River project is not the only Army Corps project that’s apparently stalling, according to Faraz Khan, legislative director for the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers, a union representing 5,500 Army Corps workers around the country.
Khan said pauses to projects are happening nationally “without any sort of real explanation,” speculating that the pauses could be political decisions made by the federal government for projects in states with Democratic leadership.
At least one other nearby suburban project — for viaduct drainage improvements in Flossmoor —is also under administrative review, a spokesperson for U.S. Rep. Robin Kelly’s office confirmed recently.
And Army Corps workers are not hearing about the pauses officially, he said, but are being reassigned to other work as projects stall.
“None of this is … good for the Army Corps,” Khan said. “It’s not good for projects to have … this entire fog of uncertainty.”
It also wouldn’t be the first time Illinois saw disruptions to Army Corps work in recent memory, with recent cuts to the Chicago Harbor Lock, the mechanism boats use to travel between Lake Michigan and the Chicago River, and a recent federal funding freeze and Army Corps management transfer for the Brandon Road Interbasin Project, a barrier system near Joliet aimed at preventing invasive carp migration.
How the dam removals on the Fox River would be funded also appears to be in question.
Illinois still has nearly $20 million it previously set aside for removing dams in Illinois, but the state had been expecting the Army Corps to contribute more than half of the total cost of the Fox River dams’ removal, the IDNR spokesperson confirmed.
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But, while the state would prefer to work with the Army Corps to share costs, the spokesman said that’s “not a requirement.” Though the IDNR was notified that the Army Corps had “placed its efforts on hold,” according to the spokesman, the state’s Office of Water Resources is still moving forward with efforts on the Fox River dams.
How municipalities and residents are responding
Now, with an uncertain future for the Army Corps study, local municipalities, residents and advocates continue to be left waiting for its results — and, in some cases, forging ahead — as they consider their dams’ futures.
Batavia, for example, is looking to eventually remove its dam, which it owns — unlike some of the other dams nearby.
The city previously attempted to deed the dam to the IDNR, according to Newman, Batavia’s city administrator. The state didn’t accept it, she said, meaning the municipality continued to have ownership over it.
The city has looked for the state to consider its dam for removal, but in the meantime has had to make improvements to it to maintain its insurance, Newman told The Beacon-News.
Geneva, meanwhile, has signaled that it wants to remain in the federal study, but hasn’t committed itself to removal of its dam.
At a meeting in November, Geneva City Administrator Alex Voigt explained to the City Council that remaining in the corps’ dam study — which the council ultimately opted to do — doesn’t obligate the city to removing or not removing the dam, but that choosing to take itself out of consideration would close the city off from receiving further information about its results.
“We’re interested in hearing what their plans are, in terms of what they find and what their recommendations will be,” Voigt said at the meeting.
St. Charles, on the other hand, appears poised to maintain at least the impoundment created by its dam, amid uncertainty about the federal study. The impoundment is essentially the body of water that forms upstream as a result of a dam.
Like other nearby municipalities, the city was told that the study was paused, and it had put its dam-related task force on hold, City Administrator McGuire told The Beacon-News.
But the city continued to look to make a decision on the dam’s future.
“Because it is ultimately affecting development along the river,” McGuire said. “People selling their houses, they want to know what the future holds.”
St. Charles residents recently got a hint at what that future might be.
Referencing the Army Corps’ continued study of the dams and noting that there are “no current efforts by the (corps) regarding the study due to lapse in federal funding,” a resolution approved by the St. Charles City Council at the start of June indicates St. Charles’ intention to keep the impoundment created by the dam. The measure also formally terminates the city’s dam task force.
The resolution essentially establishes a formal city position that had not been laid out in policy before, McGuire told The Beacon-News. It does not, however, preclude the city from continuing to work with the IDNR on modifications to the dam, nor does it require the dam structure itself remain intact, she explained, only the impoundment.
Such a policy could allow the city to retain its reputation as a destination for recreational river use, McGuire said, while still allowing St. Charles to pursue efforts meant to help improve the health of the river.
In St. Charles and beyond, recreational use has come up consistently in the conversation about the Fox River dams’ future, with some skeptical of what removal would mean for boaters and paddlers.
Pohrte, the paddler from St. Charles, explained that the city has “excellent access points” for kayakers. And the impoundment from the dam gives paddlers a long run to use for their purposes.
He typically goes out on the river two or three times a week from April through November, making a roughly eight-mile loop out of Ferson Creek Park in St. Charles. He paddles with his family, serves as the canoe club’s vice commodore and has in recent years landed some of the top times at the Mid-American Canoe & Kayak Race, held annually on the Fox.
Having deeper, slower water helps those who are new to kayaking, adaptable users who can’t get their boat stuck, rowers and stand-up paddle boarders and lower-income users with inflatable boats or boats with less control, he explained. Even for Pohrte, there could be times of year where the water is too shallow for him to go out on the river should the dams be removed, he said.
Dams do mean a structure for paddlers to navigate around, but Pohrte indicated that the alternative, in a way, creates a greater barrier.
“Sure, you can say, ‘Yeah, this improves kayaking because it’s a lot more fun for me,’” Pohrte said of removing the dams. “But … you reduce access for a lot of other people.”
He suggested removal could happen on a case-by-case basis, advocating against St. Charles’ dam being torn down, but expressing support for the recent removal of the dam in Carpentersville, for example.
“I can see the environmental advantages of removal,” Pohrte said. “It’s just, I also see the recreational advantages … at some level, it does make sense to have environmental impacts for the benefit of people.”
The 2023 study, however, cites recreational users as a group that stands to benefit from dam removal, since allowing the river to flow freely would eliminate paddlers’ need to portage around dams and reduce their risk of going over or getting stuck on one. Though powerboating would likely be negatively impacted because of the shallower water, paddling has a “lower barrier to entry” than motorboating, the study points out, and can “therefore be pursued by a wider swath of the public.”
Cecily Nordstrom, of Batavia, also spoke to the recreational uses the river provides.
Having grown up in the area, Nordstrom moved back 15 years ago and has for years been paddling on the Fox.
“The rivers are way more used than they were when I was growing up,” Nordstrom said. “We were never on them when I was a kid.”
Nordstrom said she isn’t in favor of total dam removal, expressing concern about the possible changes to water levels, though she pointed to improved water quality and better biodiversity as upsides.
Nevertheless, the matter doesn’t appear close to a resolution, she thinks.
“The consensus is, from people that I speak with, is, ‘Oh yeah, this has just been going on for years. They’re never going to do anything,’” Nordstrom said.
Todd Surta — a longtime resident who works with the Fox River Preservation Society, a group that has advocated for preserving St. Charles’ dam — similarly hypothesized that the study isn’t “on people’s radar screens right now.”
“It seems like we went from steaming ahead,” Surta said, “to a full stop.”
Surta boats, kayaks and fishes on the Fox, which his kids grew up swimming in, he said.
But he suggested there’s only so much that can be done as locals invested in the matter wait for updates.
“This was one of those things where you can’t compel something to happen,” Surta said. “It’s just going to run its course.”
Some education and study efforts at the local level remain underway, however, even as progress appears to have stalled at the federal level.
The Fox River Study Group — a coalition of municipal leaders, Kane County and other stakeholders that are researching the Fox River dams’ potential removal — said that, in 2025, it completed a water quality study and a biological survey of freshwater mussels at the Carpentersville dam site to compare with previous data it had collected at the location before the dam was removed in late 2024. The idea is to help better understand the impact of dam removal, group members told The Beacon-News in early May.
And this year, the study group is undertaking a joint project with the IDNR’s Office of Water Resources to provide a detailed river flow model from the Stratton Dam in the north to Yorkville in the south.
Likewise, the Friends of the Fox River, a group largely in favor of dam removal, is continuing to do public education on the issue, according to the group’s president Gary Swick.
An Elgin resident who says he canoes and goes out along the river with his dog, Swick theorizes that most people in the community don’t know much about the pros and cons of the Fox’s dams, through many likely agree on a lot about the river and its value to the communities it runs through.
So the group is looking to continue public education efforts on the dam issue, Swick said, including plans to form a coalition of groups to do an education campaign on the potential removal of the dams.
Education is one component to advocating for dam removal, according to Margaret Frisbie, the Friends of the Chicago River’s executive director. The group’s own dam removal efforts on the Chicago River have therefore incorporated public meetings and addressing questions individuals have.
“People have cultural and social connections to dams,” Frisbie said. “There’s this whole human significance that I think, when we go through processes of dam removal, that aren’t necessarily taken into the planning when you’re looking at it from a purely ecological and human safety point of view.”
But, despite the resistance, Frisbie said people don’t generally regret dam removal.
Now, amid the studies, the politics, the hold-ups and continued efforts by municipalities and local groups, some are just looking for answers — and attempting to move forward, whatever that might look like.
“I think there’s just a lot of fatigue,” Pohrte said. “Now that it’s been two, almost three years … it just gets to be a lot.”
In St. Charles, the city opted to establish its own policy on its dam, giving the city greater “flexibility” to work with the IDNR and Army Corps on what to do next, according to McGuire. That could include efforts to retain the water’s depth while still accomplishing environmental goals — which may not necessarily require keeping the dam structure itself.
The city could, for example, look into placing a sort of tiered stone structure, McGuire said, that’s “more of a natural pathway for both the water and the aquatic life that lives in the river.”
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In Batavia, there will come a point where the city’s insurance will decline to cover the dam, according to Newman, so the city is aiming for eventual removal. But the city is still waiting on the results of the Army Corps’ study, she said, and plans to apply for any available funding that would help it pay for removal costs.
“I think (the community is) anxious for us to get … to the point of having a … plan to execute in the event that the dam is removed,” Newman said.
But, much like the future of the Army Corps’ study of the dams, exactly what the city’s plans will be isn’t entirely set.
“At the moment, you know, things are kind of at a standstill,” Newman said. “However, I think the whole project represents an amazing opportunity for us to rethink this recreational area that is at the heart of our city.”
The Tribune’s Talia Soglin contributed.