Enough is enough:
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Enough is enough:
Why authorities should reject the proposed landfill in Scott County
Dear Editor
I am a lifelong resident of Scott County, Tennessee, a region known for its rough-hewn beauty and people living in concert with its rugged terrain. Unfortunately, it also has a history of “boom and bust” economies associated with outside business interests exploiting the county’s vast natural resources and rapidly exiting once the resources have been siphoned off. Despite the “busts,” Scott Countians are collectively known for our resilience (and occasionally for full-on stubbornness). We tend to rely on our well-known heritage of dogged determination (and deep faith in God) to survive adversity, even when the odds are stacked against us.
After generations of laboring in the timber and coal industries, Scott County and its people have recently charted a new path, again one rooted in the county’s natural beauty and resources. Adventure tourism and retirement that revolve around the Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area, multiple local and state parks, and forests, have provided a foundation for a new economy, one that allows this previously rural industrial people to stay on the lands that sustained them for over two hundred years and one that conserves the region’s rich biodiversity for ages to come.
However, a new outside force now threatens to undermine this progress and choke Scott County’s new economic taproot at its source: our free-flowing streams and rivers. Capiche LLC from Cleveland, Tennessee, and a small handful of local businesspeople have proposed a new landfill adjacent to the already questionable Volunteer Regional Landfill in North Oneida (that sits atop springs and streams that feed into the Big South Fork of the Cumberland River), one massive enough to accept train cars of garbage and toxic waste from New York and other northeastern corridor locales which are unwilling to deal with their own refuse. Capiche LLC and its associates have proposed a solution to this urban detritus – ship it to our rural community, one that cannot (and should not) be raped and pillaged again by outside robber barons who care nothing about the health and environmental consequences of their unscrupulous business practices.
The current landfill has a documented compliance problem, with leachate overflowing into nearby streams and groundwater. Consider this: Scott County is home to one of the wettest climates in the Continental U.S., routinely receiving over 65 inches of rain annually. While accustomed to prolonged rains, thankfully, we were spared Hurricane Helene’s recent wrath (due to a slight shift in the jet stream). Still, suppose this new landfill is allowed to proceed, and we experience a Helene-style rainfall. In that case, the resulting 1,500-acre mass of toxic refuse, most of it from the Northeast, is almost certain to leach not only into our waterways and land, but also into those along the Cumberland River, including Nashville. According to the Environmental and Energy Study Institute, Tennessee is already home to one of the world’s most plastic-polluted rivers, the Tennessee, with more microplastic particulates than most other rivers in the world. A massive landfill of this type could push the Cumberland River into its ranks, polluting much of the state.
As a nurse practitioner and researcher, I have witnessed up close the long-lasting health consequences of our region’s past “boom” economies, with mine-associated cancers plaguing many in our area. But I have also watched the downward spiral of poverty and poor health that resulted from the “busts.” Today, we in Scott County have a genuine opportunity to continue on our new path toward a healthier (and wealthier) future for our families, but only if we can prevent new toxic threats to our people and our environment.
Other than the dozen or so principal investors in the landfill expansion, NO ONE in Scott or the surrounding communities wants this proposed business deal to proceed. With so many other honorable, healthy, and economically sustainable uses of this land, why, on “God’s green Earth,” would authorities permit this misuse of Scott County’s land and its people? Enough is enough. Please work to stop this project in its tracks before it’s too late by calling your state senator and representatives to voice your opposition – future generations will thank you.
Tracey Tibbals Stansberry, PhD, MSN, APRN