The Benton County Board of Commissioners has voted to deny the proposed expansion of the Coffin Butte Landfill, reversing a previous decision made in November 2025. The decision was finalized on March 3 and has been sent to the Oregon Land Use Board of Appeals for review.
Initially, the board had approved Republic Services’ application for a Conditional Use Permit to expand the landfill. This approval was appealed in December 2025. In response, Commissioner Nancy Wyse moved to withdraw the original decision for reconsideration during a meeting on December 16, with support from Commissioner Pat Malone. The motion passed unanimously.
Due to requirements for public transparency in quasi-judicial land use cases, details about the reconsideration were not shared until a public hearing held on January 20. At that hearing, following input from planning staff, the board reopened the public record for case LU-24-027 specifically to consider a pre-enforcement notice issued by the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) on November 6.
The reopened record allowed seven days each for new evidence submission, responses, and final rebuttal from applicants over a total period of three weeks. After reviewing all submissions during this period, county planning staff released an updated report on February 24 recommending denial of the permit.
“Staff finds that the November DEQ PEN calls into question some of the application’s odor model assumptions, as further explained below, and further that the application does not provide sufficient analysis of adjacent odor-sensitive land uses such as the neighboring horse therapy business and residences to demonstrate that the landfill expansion will not seriously interfere with those uses on adjacent properties. Therefore, the Applicant has not met its burden of proof to show that the proposed use will not seriously interfere with adjacent land uses. Staff recommends denial of LU-24-027,” stated county planning staff in their report.
During deliberations at their March 3 meeting, Commissioner Gabe Shepherd moved “to adopt an order reversing the Board’s November 2025 decision, and that the Conditional Use Permit be denied based on evidence in the record and findings in the February 24, 2026 staff report, and conclusions developed by the BOC during these deliberations, and that these findings and conclusions be adopted as the final decision of the Board.” Commissioner Wyse seconded this motion; it passed unanimously.
Recordings from both key hearings are available through the Board of Commissioners Meeting Portal. The full public record related to case LU-24-027 can also be accessed via the County’s website, where additional information about both this specific application and general land use procedures is provided.
