Loudon County, Tennessee
The landfill is growing toward the houses. The permit is already filed.
Every orange line on this map is somebody's property boundary. The bare ground at the center is the working face of the Matlock Bend Class I landfill. Republic Services has submitted Part One of a permit to expand it horizontally.
Chapter 01 The filing
This is not a proposal. It is an application in progress.
Part One of the horizontal expansion permit has been submitted. The geotechnical investigation is ongoing and is expected to continue into early 2027, with water quality work to follow. All Army Corps of Engineers jurisdictional requirements are complete, and the hydrogeologic work plan already given to the Commission supports the Part Two submission.
The county is on the hook. Republic Services operates the site, but the landfill permit is held by Loudon County through this Commission — which is why TDEC asks the county, not the operator, to formally answer for conditions on the ground.
Approach From orbit to the fenceline
It is easier to argue about a landfill than to look at one. So look at it.
East Tennessee. The Valley and Ridge, folded northeast to southwest, and the river running through it.
Loudon County. The Tennessee River bends west around a peninsula. The pale ground on that peninsula is the landfill.
This is the same ground photographed thirteen times between 2007 and 2023. Watch the pale area, and watch the trees between it and the water.
The lined cell and the pond visible in the earliest frames are gone — buried under a single continuous mass that spreads south and west.
The expansion now filed adds 19.6 acres on the north side — on ground the applicant's own map marks with streams.
Satellite and aerial imagery: Tennessee Department of Transportation via TN GIS (2007); USDA Farm Service Agency, National Agriculture Imagery Program (public domain), accessed via Microsoft Planetary Computer; and Esri World Imagery Wayback (Microsoft, Maxar). Each frame is labelled with its own capture date. Site location from the TDEC solid-waste permit.
Chapter 02 What is next to it
Look at the map behind this text. The pale terraced ground is the landfill.
The orange mesh pressing against it on the north and east is not forest. It is subdivided residential lots, street by street, already platted.
On the west, the Tennessee River. This is the shape of the decision: a Class I landfill with a river on one side and neighborhoods on the other, applying to grow sideways.
The expansion permit does not need anyone's vote to be filed. It is filed.
What you are looking at
Chapter 03 The eastern slope
The inspector came in July. He came back in August.
TDEC issued Areas of Concern for exposed waste and for flagging along the east slope, both tied to the availability of soil. The landfill manager submitted these photographs of that slope into the public record on September 2, 2026.
Cover soil is the whole dispute. The site hauls roughly 400 to 600 cubic yards of soil a week for daily cover, but that hauled material cannot legally be used for final cover, which requires a certified two-foot compacted layer, geosynthetics and a further foot of topsoil. The on-site borrow soil that does conform is not accessible pending a grading permit.
Chapter 04 Who is minding it
The chair resigned, and he was also the man holding the records.
On September 17, 2026 the Commission opened by announcing that notice had arrived the previous day: Adam Waller had resigned from the Solid Waste Disposal Commission. He had held two jobs at once — chair, and the person in charge of the Commission's public records.
Commissioner Ross was nominated and elected chair the same night, on a motion by Gary with a second from Tyler, Ross abstaining and no votes against. Vice chair, secretary and a replacement public records officer were all left unfilled — the incoming chair said she wanted to define the records job before asking anyone to take it.
During public comment a citizen said the election was about five months late, that the Commission's own procedures called for it in April, and that the February through May minutes contain no mention of one. The chair acknowledged the point and committed to keeping to the calendar.
A resident's public records request has now been outstanding more than sixty days. At the September meeting the Commission could not give a date for it.
The documents this page is built from
Chapter 05 What you can actually do
Three things, and none of them require a lawyer.
Go to the next Commission meeting
Public comment happens at the start. The county publishes the schedule. The room is small, and attendance is visible in the record.
02 — AskFile a public records request
Tennessee law gives you the right to inspect these records. The Commission's records officer post is currently vacant, so send requests to the chair and copy the county open records office.
03 — WriteSubmit written public comment
Written comment goes into the packet and becomes part of the permanent record, whether or not you can attend in person.