The Town of Providence Village hosted its annual Spring Clean-Up event on Saturday.
The event was organized outside of town hall as a drive-through with many different waste disposal stations.
“Events like these—it really helps keep Providence Village clean, safe and environmentally responsible,” Communications/ Deputy Town Secretary Delaney McGuire said. “We really appreciate everyone who comes out to participate, and it's always great to see the community come together for something that benefits everybody.”
The waste-disposal company, Republic Services, provided services to collect bulk trash, household hazardous waste and electronics.
Sierra Shred provided on-site paper shredding, and the Aubrey Police Department handled prescription drug disposal.
Also there to help were some of the town’s code compliance officers and the maintenance crew, who kept the event running smoothly.
In conjunction with the spring clean-up, it was also the Drug Enforcement Administration’s National Prescription Drug Takeback Day.
For the last three years, the DEA has provided all the materials needed to host the Drug Take Back Event in both Aubrey and Providence Village, including flyers, boxes to package the medication and verbiage for social media posts.
Detective Jake Kennedy staffed the Providence Village site, and Detective Bobby Hunt was at the Aubrey Police Department station in downtown Aubrey.
The police department collected four boxes from Providence Village and two boxes from Aubrey.
Between the two locations, 119 pounds were collected, which was triple the number from last year, Kennedy said.
“Over the past few years, we've really increased our social media presence, and we've been able to get that advertised and pushed out on all platforms,” Assistant Chief Jeremy Johnson said. “The PD's page, the fire department's page and then the city of Aubrey’s page, and then plus the town of Providence Village pushed it out on their social medias. The more the word gets out, the more residents you're going to have to respond, and our population is growing exponentially, so that's a lot of it, too.”
Kennedy explained the importance of events like these where residents can drop off expired or unwanted medications for proper disposal.
“The biggest thing is community caretaking, making sure that kids aren't getting into old medications that are unsecured, making sure they're properly disposed of so they're not going down the drain, back into our water system safely,” Kennedy said.
Separate from the DEA drug take-back, residents were also able to get containers of sharps, like hypodermic needles and syringes, properly disposed of at the event.
“It's a chance for people to fully clear out any hazardous items that may be around their house and dispose of them properly with an agency that knows how to deal with those substances,” Kennedy said.
Residents can get approved sharp containers properly disposed of yearround at Aubrey Fire Station No. 3.
Both the clean-up days and the DEA Drug Take Backs are held twice a year, in the spring and fall.
“If somebody wants to dispose properly of their medications when we're not having an event, they just have to go onto the DEA website and type in their zip code, and it'll give them a list of year-round drop-off locations in their area,” Kennedy said.
