Law enforcement agencies across the state will be participating in National Drug Take-Back Day on Saturday, April 29th.

The collection event is part of a nationwide effort to safely dispose of unused or leftover medications.

“Prescription drugs are a huge issue,” said JCPD Captain Chuck Leithoff. “[People don’t know] what to do with them when you don’t take them anymore and you have leftovers or they expire.”

Older methods of disposing of unused or unwanted medicines – flushing them down the toilet or throwing them in the trash – are no longer recommended, specifically flushing them because it “has a lasting effect to the water supply.”

Take-back Day is coordinated by the Federal Drug Enforcement Administration which collects the medications from the the local agencies and then safely disposes of them.

“We can take anything – except anything with sharps in it, that’s needles or anything like that, and we can’t take any glass,” said Leithoff. “You can bring those [medications] in and there’s no questions asked, we don’t ask for I.D. or anything.”

Take-Back Day is Saturday, April 29th from 10:00 am until 2:00 pm.

Local agencies participating include:

• Junction City Police Department at the JCPD lobby area, 210 E. 9th Street
• Abilene Police Department at the Abilene Community Center, 1020 NW 8th Street – Abilene
• Clay Center Police Department at the Clay Co. Health Dept, 820 Spellman Circle – Clay Center
• Wabaunsee County Sheriff’s Office, 215 Kansas Ave 4th floor – Alma