With the Middle Tennessee landfill in Rutherford County nearly full, and more than 11,000 new homes planned for the area, lawmakers are pushing for urgent reforms to Tennessee鈥檚 waste management system. Two state senators, Heidi Campbell and Mark Pody, are leading the conversation with vastly different strategies but a shared goal: to reduce the waste piling up across Tennessee and avoid a future where the state must ship trash to neighboring states.
Senator Heidi Campbell (D-Nashville) is championing Tennessee Waste for Jobs, a comprehensive bill designed to overhaul how the state handles packaging waste. Her approach? Make major brands鈥攏ot taxpayers鈥攑ay for the waste their packaging creates.
The bill would require companies to pay into a Producer Responsibility Organization (PRO), a nonprofit fund that covers the cost of collecting, sorting, and recycling packaging. Companies that use easily recyclable materials would pay less; those that use hard-to-recycle materials would pay more.