Stepping outside her home on Britt Road near St. Pauls has become a burden for Viv Tolson Wayne.
Warm days are the worst. That’s when dozens of buzzards line her yard, attracted by the stench of the Robeson County Landfill across the street.
Wayne, 74, said the odor irritates her persistent cough and makes her eyes sting. Sometimes her arms break out in a rash. Several neighbors have developed chronic illnesses and cancer since the landfill was built in 1995, she said.
“The Bible says your latter days are supposed to be your best days,” Wayne told Robeson County commissioners on Monday. “I’m fighting just to breathe in my own front yard.”
Wayne was among roughly 75 community members, activists and environmental lawyers who attended a public hearing to speak out against a proposal to expand the county-owned landfill. It would be the seventh expansion in 30 years, adding about 35 acres to the 537-acre site.
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Some who addressed the commissioners said they worried the project would lower their property values. But most said their biggest concern was PFAS, known as “forever chemicals” that have been linked to adverse health effects.
“Before you do this again,” Wayne said, “I think you need to know the impact the existing landfill has on our community.”
After about a dozen people spoke for more than an hour, the board voted unanimously to delay action on the proposal until September to explore ways to conduct more PFAS testing.
Toxic chemicals are not a new concern at the Robeson County landfill. Reports of heavy metals in groundwater near the site date back to the early 2000s, according to the Southern Environmental Law Center.
PFAS levels at the site are higher than at any other landfill in North Carolina, according to a sampling in March by the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality. (The state began mandating PFAS testing at landfills in 2023.)
In November, the N.C. Department of Waste Management sent the Robeson County solid waste department a letter warning of high contamination levels. It said the county must “take immediate action to terminate and control the discharge, and mitigate any hazards resulting from exposure to the pollutants.” The county has not yet submitted the mandated report despite a 90-day deadline, records show.
Attorneys with the Southern Environmental Law Center say the Robeson County Landfill has “a pattern of persistent non-compliance with basic operational requirements,” which include overgrown vegetation, recurring leaks and a failure to implement proper monitoring.
The landfill is less than 10 miles from Chemours’ Fayetteville Works facility. PFAS, including the toxic chemical GenX, manufactured at the plant have contaminated groundwater and the lower Cape Fear River. Residents in several counties, including Bladen and Robeson, can have their private wells tested for free by Chemours, as ordered by the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality.
In 2020, Chemours sent 40 truckloads with 826.5 tons of contaminated soil, which contained GenX, to the Robeson County Landfill, according to research from the Southern Environmental Law Center.
“Chemours used this landfill as a dumping ground,” Maia Hutt, an attorney with the legal advocacy nonprofit, told commissioners on Monday. “There is likely more contamination here than we are aware of right now.”
Prior to Monday’s hearing, Hutt and attorney Zoe Metha submitted a 27-page letter to the county outlining why a landfill expansion would be harmful to the community. The document includes several recommendations, including to test the wells of every household in the area for PFAS.
“The landfill has a long history of leaching toxic substances into groundwater, emitting unsafe concentrations of explosive gases, and flouting the terms of environmental permits issued by the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality,” the letter said.
Environmental injustice
Robeson County, home to about 117,000 people, has only one landfill. Van Burbach, a hydrologist for LaBella Associates, a consulting firm that developed the landfill expansion plan, said the project would “better handle the present and future waste needs of Robeson County residents and businesses.”
Commissioner Lance Herndon, who represents the St. Pauls area, pressed Burbach about PFAS concerns, asking if the expansion would address contamination.
Burbach said toxic chemicals are a “separate issue” from the landfill expansion.
“PFAS are a growing concern around the country,” he said. “But as far as we know, we don’t know any details about how PFAS plays into this site plan application.”
Since he took office in January, President Donald Trump has repealed Biden-era regulations around PFAS. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced last week plans to scrap limits on three types of PFAS, including GenX. EPA administrator Lee Zeldin said the agency wants to give small, rural communities “common sense flexibility” to comply with the regulations.
“All of a sudden, when you get to rural places, poor places, Black places, we act like we don’t know what to do. It’s always a systemic problem.”
Kyron Williams, an organizer with the Environmental Justice Community Action Network
Robeson County has long been considered the target of environmental injustice. Kyron Williams, an organizer with the Environmental Justice Community Action Network in North Carolina, said the landfill is another example of turning poor communities into dumping grounds.
According to the 2022 American Community Survey, 84% of residents in the U.S. Census block where the landfill is located are non-white. More than one-fourth of residents live below the federal poverty line.
“We see landfills in wealthy areas that are expertly managed; they don’t have health issues or the contamination,” Williams told the Border Belt Independent after Monday’s meeting. “All of a sudden, when you get to rural places, poor places, Black places, we act like we don’t know what to do. It’s always a systemic problem.”
‘I’m not angry’
Neighbors organized in 2017 and 2018 to oppose expansions of the Robeson County landfill. Both times, commissioners agreed to keep the landfill growing.
The landfill now accepts trash from Bladen, Cumberland, Hoke, Scotland and other counties. It made a profit of about $3 million in the 2024-2025 fiscal year, according to a county audit.
Concerns from residents who went to Monday’s hearing almost went unheard. Robeson County Attorney Rob Davis told those opposing the landfill expansion to “select a spokesperson” to address commissioners on behalf of the group.
“If a lot of folks basically have the same concerns and comments,” Davis said, “in the interest of time, I’ll ask who supports that person’s position.”
After two people spoke, Davis suggested commissioners close the public hearing. But the Rev. Mac Legerton then approached the podium.
“I’m not angry,” Legerton, a longtime community organizer and environmental activist in Robeson County, said. “But there is a spiritual feeling of sorrow in here. And I think you need to hear from them in the community.”
Legerton’s comments were met with applause from the crowd. Commissioners decided to hear from others in the community.
“When a ship springs a leak and risks sinking the ship and harming the passengers,” Legerton said, “the best action is always to fix the leak first. That’s what we need here in Robeson County.”
