Drug Take Back Community Outreach
The Wyoming County Drug Take Back Days (coordinated by the Federal Drug Enforcement Agency - DEA) take place twice a year in the Tunkhannock Area. Although the Wyoming County District Attorney’s (DA) office runs this program, and is responsible for the collection, security and proper disposal of the drugs, the Tunkhannock Rotary Club helps the DA’s office educate the public about this important program to clean old, expired or no longer needed prescription drugs out of people’s medicine cabinets. Most abused prescription drugs come from family and friends. Any one of us could become a drug dealer and not even know it.
In March 2014, in cooperation with the DA’s office, a Tunkhannock Rotary committee led by Matt Pompey took responsibility for all public relations and advertisement for this program, including:
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distribution of posters to local businesses to advertise the event,
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public service announcements that aired over 250 times on 10 radio stations,
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newspaper articles and ads highlighting the dangers of these unneeded medications, especially for the young,
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radio interviews on the program and
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communications with civic organizations, Tyler Memorial Hospital administrators and church clergy who alerted their membership at meetings, from the pulpit and in their newsletters.
Two very successful Drug Take Back Days were held in 2014 at CVS and Lech’s Pharmacies in Tunkhannock and Lech’s Pharmacy in Laceyville. In 2015, Lech’s Pharmacy in Nicholson was added as a collection point.
When Wyoming County District Attorney Jeff Mitchell spoke to the Club on Aug 14, 2014, he reported that April 2014’s Drug Take Back Day resulted in the collection of 131 pounds of drugs from people’s medicine cabinets, significantly more drugs than ever before.
Detective David Ide from the DA’s office credited the amazing turnout and success of the April 2014’s collections to the educational outreach conducted by the Tunkhannock Rotary Club. Many people said they never knew this program existed and were thankful for all the information the Club provided prior to Drug Take Back Day. As a result, the DA’s office indicated that the Club made a big difference and asked for the Club’s continued educational and outreach support for this twice annual program.
Drugs Collected on Drug Take Back Days after Rotary’s Outreach Efforts
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The Table shows that the program has been becoming increasing successful as we expand our community outreach efforts. Since the program began in 2010, over 1 ton of pills and drugs have been collected on the collection days. The first 8 collections cumulatively took approximately 400 pounds of prescription drugs out of peoples’ medicine cabinets. The collections that occurred after the Rotary Club took responsibility for the community outreach efforts accounted for almost 2,000 pounds of pills and drugs, demonstrating the power of the Club collaborating with the DA’s office to educate and inform the community.
In 2018, Rotary expanded its community efforts to outreach for the 3 permanent drug drop boxes set up by the DA's Office at the Wyoming County Courthouse, the Tunkhannock Police Dept. and the Tunkhannock Township Police Dept. These boxes are available throughout the year for drop off of drugs between Take Back Events.
In 2018, Rotary also joined the Wyoming County Coalition HOPE, a consortium of community, law enforcement and health organizations to develop programs and strategies to ameliorate the opioid crisis in Wyoming County. Rotary is part of the Community Education sub-group.