District 1 Metro Councilman Lonnell Matthews Jr. threw his support behind the proposed May Town Center development Wednesday, the eve of the much-anticipated public hearing in front of the Planning Commission.

A year ago, it was Matthews who expressed pessimism about the proposed $4 billion development to be located in rural Bells Bend. The Planning Commission deferred the original zoning request.

Since that time, developers Tony Giarratana and the May family have scaled back the development, which Matthews said makes the proposal easier to support.

Matthews said the reality is that Bells Bend would be developed eventually and his preference was that the development be one with buffers that conserve the surrounding properties.

Bells Bend residents have rallied to oppose a proposed landfill and a subdivision development from coming to the area.

“Everyone is under the assumption that the Bend will be developed in some sort of way,” Matthews said. “It could be a subdivision, or a landfill, or something else the city needs to have. And those types of projects are targeted to District 1 or District 3.

“So we’re targets for that unless we start to try to think of how we actually want to develop the community. If you’re not going to be proactive, you’re going to get the leftover projects other neighborhoods wouldn’t want.”

Matthews called the relationship between May Town developers and Tennessee State “a blessing,” and said the addition of an agricultural research facility for the university was a benefit to the project.

But Matthews was also adamant that the project made sense in its scaled-back form, which would accommodate about 20,000 residents and commuting workers to the mixed-use business park and residential development.

As for concerns surrounding traffic raised by Metro Council members whose districts would face pass-through commuters, Matthews said those are “sincere and valid.”

“I think the developers know that the scenario where a second bridge would be required would be if there are more than 19,000 to 20,000 people, and they know they want to keep it at that scale,” Matthews said.

Matthews acknowledged that a majority of residents oppose the development, but said dueling polls by those opposed and in support were hard to interpret.

“Basically, if you’re doing a poll, you can get whatever results you want,” Matthews said. “If you look at it in terms of how much land people own in close proximity to the development, you’d see a majority support the project.”

Matthews said he was saving his analysis of the project for his comments at Thursday’s Planning Commission public hearing.

An economic impact study of the project will be released next week and a second public hearing on that study only will take place June 25 at Metro Southeast. The Planning Commission figures to vote after the public hearing is closed.