A $1.6 Billion Agency You've Never Thought About on the Ballot Next Week

Bonus 312 content through March 17. I'm sick and the primary is next week, so you're getting a few different election cheat sheets between regular issues (including some done MONTHS ago, but never published).

This deep dive, on one race that I think needs more attention, is based on what readers have told me they want to know more about. Got an issue or election you want to see covered before next Tuesday? Hit reply.

What is Metropolitan Water Reclamation District?

It doesn't run ads. It doesn't have beef with the mayor. It doesn't trend on Twitter.

But it quietly controls a $1.6 billion budget, runs seven wastewater treatment plants across Cook County, and operates Deep Tunnel — one of the largest public infrastructure projects on the planet, under construction since the 1970s, still not finished — which is the reason your basement doesn't fill with sewage every time it storms. Also, it sits on the western shore of a lake system that holds over 20% of the world's fresh surface water. So, you know. Low stakes.

Three seats on this board are on your ballot Tuesday. Four candidates. Here's your cheat sheet — or, if your attention span is even shorter, the IG carousel.

Keep: Precious Brady-Davis (who, to be clear, we interviewed for this guide and would have been totally unable to put this together without her and her team’s help) is the first Black trans woman elected to public office in Cook County and has served on the board for

Before MWRD she spent six years at the Sierra Club running climate campaigns and launched a $1.6 million CDC grant at Center on Halsted. On the board, she chairs Procurement, where she led an outside audit of MWRD's purchasing process. She supported funding for the Ostara program as part of her work on the board — which captures phosphorus from wastewater and converts it to fertilizer instead of letting it poison rivers — and backed a drug take-back partnership to keep prescription meds out of the water supply. She's also been doing something almost unheard of for an MWRD commissioner: explaining what the agency does, in public, on social media, in plain language. As she told us: "If people do not understand programs like green alleys, rain barrels, or permeable pavement, they cannot take advantage of them."

Brady-Davis also supports Space to Grow — turning CPS school playgrounds into green infrastructure that absorbs stormwater instead of sending it into the sewers — and wants to stop leasing MWRD-owned land to polluters. She also"When basements flood, when neighborhoods face pollution — that is not abstract policy," she said. "That is real life. Government has a responsibility to get it right."

Keep: Eira Corral Sepúlveda. She has expanded transparency on MWRD's land use policy, pushed contractor diversity, massively expanded community outreach, and created an engineering internship pipeline through City Colleges.

The real race: Sarah Bury vs. Beth McElroy Kirkwood. This is the seat worth paying attention to. Bury has a Master's in environmental politics, was Water Issue Specialist for the League of Women Voters, was a Water Quality Fellow at the Alliance for the Great Lakes, and ran field operations for the Bring Chicago Home ballot measure. She's a 49th Ward resident and a Sierra Club volunteer who put her legal background to work as a watchdog for municipal water quality compliance.

In contrast, McElroy Kirkwood was appointed by Pritzker at the end of 2024 with no environmental background.

Her political experience is Orland Township committeewoman and community college board trustee. When asked about her qualifications, she said the commission has scientists and lawyers on staff to fill the gaps.

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Like we said at the beginning: this is a board that controls $1.6 billion and sits between Cook County and one of the largest freshwater systems on Earth — who runs it really matters, in spite of the obscurity.

I bothered Stephanie Skora of Girl, I Guess, about what this race means in context -- and she described this particular board race as reflecting a shift happening across Illinois municipal races: as the political machine that used to run Illinois continues to decay, the very low bar of "not corrupt" is finally cleared -- so the real standard for this MWRD election is making sure candidates have the actual qualifications needed to run this body well.

By that measure, in the contested MWRD races, this one's not even close.For the full cheat sheet for every race on your March 17 ballot, check out Girl, I Guess: girliguess.com