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| Kim Strauser Director of Prevention for the Allegany Council on Alcoholism and Substance Abuse, Inc. and Undersheriff Kevin Monroe at the Canaseraga Pill Drop location |
Canaseraga and Cuba– On Saturday, October 27 the Allegany
County Fall Pill Drop was held in conjunction with the Drug Enforcement
Administration’s (DEA) National Prescription Drug Take Back Day. Canaseraga and
Cuba were chosen for the fall locations.
The pill drop event allows the community to drop off unused, expired, or
unwanted medications and provides the opportunity for education on the location
of the pill drop boxes in the various communities. In Cuba there is a drop box
located at the Cuba Police Department, 15 Water Street. For Canaseraga
residents the closest pill drop boxes are located at the Fillmore Pharmacy,
10560 Route 19 and at the Dansville Police Department, 14 Clara Barton Street.
The pill drop boxes are available for anyone to use.
This event was held in partnership with the Allegany Council
on Alcoholism and Substance Abuse, Inc.(ACASA), the Allegany County Sheriff’s
Office, the Cuba Police Department, and Partners for Prevention in Allegany
County(PPAC). Medications were accepted from 10am to 2pm, and between the two
locations, a total of 32 cars stopped and 66.4 pounds of medications were
collected. “The Cuba Police Department is proud to partner with PPAC for the
Allegany County Pill Drops. We also recognize the importance of our drop box
located in our lobby. These services bring us together with local, state, and
federal partners to fight the abuse of prescription drugs that is fueling the
nation’s opioid epidemic. These are small, but vital steps that help reduce the
chances of prescription medications being misused,” stated Chief Dustin Burch
of the Cube Police Department.
Each car that stopped received a Take It To The Box magnet,
which lists all of the pill drop box locations throughout Allegany County. In addition
to those previously mentioned, there are boxes at: the Allegany County
Sheriff’s Office and Nicholson’s Pharmacy in Belmont, Alfred Pharmacy and
Alfred State’s Office of University Police, Friendship Pharmacy, Jones Memorial
Medical Practice in Bolivar, Wellsville Police Department and the Jones
Memorial Hospital in Wellsville. This calendar year, 1,351 pounds of
medications have been collected from the pill drop box locations.
The pill drop events and boxes are completely anonymous and
confidential. Once the Sheriff’s Office has collected the medications, they are
transported to an undisclosed location for incineration. Incinerating the
medications makes them harmless to the environment. “The pill drop events allow
us to educate the community on safe disposal and where the drop boxes are
located” states PPAC Coordinator Jonathan Chaffee. “There was one prescription
turned in that had 1975 as its year of being prescribed, which tells me that
education on disposing of medications is still needed.”
“The Sheriff’s Office would like to thank the Canaseraga and
Cuba community for utilizing the pill drops to safely dispose of their unwanted
medications,” stated Undersheriff Kevin Monroe. “By collecting and destroying
these substances, we greatly reduce the amount available to find their way onto
our streets and into the hands of our youth.”
The agencies involved would like to send out a special
“Thank You” to the Canaseraga and Cuba Fire Departments for giving us a space
to hold the pill drop events. The next pill drop event will not be until April,
2019. More information about the pill
drop box locations can be found at
https://ppaccentral.org/pill-drop-locations/.
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| Bill Penman Executive Director of the Allegany Council on Alcoholism and Substance Abuse, Inc., Walt Mackney of the Cuba Police Department, Linda Botens and Steve Mitchell of Town Cuba Ambulance, and Chief Dustin Burch of the Cuba Police Department. |