Township To Accept Expired, Unneeded Prescriptions By End of Week

Township residents wishing to dispose of expired prescription medications or prescriptions that are no longer needed will have a safe method of doing so by the end of the week.

A secured bin to be installed at the township police department will allow Lacey residents to drop off those medications 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, Deputy Mayor Gary Quinn said at Thursday's Township Committee meeting. There is no paperwork required to drop off medication, Quinn said.

Though suggestions have been made to place bins in other spots around town, Quinn said that disposal of medications dropped into the bins is heavily regulated. The police have to track and keep an accounting of all the disposed medications, which must be incinerated.

The hope is that residents will use the bin to help reduce the number of prescription drugs, such as oxycodone, that are finding their way into the hands of teens, who don't see them as dangerous because they are prescription drugs, said Bill Moss, a resident who works with the township's drug awareness coalition.

Prescription drugs are feeding the heroin problem in town, Moss said, because kids are getting hooked on oxycodone then transitioning to heroin which is much cheaper and more easily obtained.

In the meantime, the township has been working to combat the drug problem that has resulted in two suspected heroin overdoses this month, one of which was fatal, Most said. who was found with 191 bags of heroin in his possession during the execution of a search warrant, Quinn said.