Volunteers help hospital patients vote

More than 25 volunteers at the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles are helping patients obtain absentee ballots so they can vote, hospital officials say. Allison Rotter, volunteer services manager at Cedars-Sinai, says often patients end up in the hospital unexpectedly, or have been ill and may not have had time to obtain an absentee ballot. The volunteers will visit hundreds of patient rooms to ensure any registered voter can exercise their right to vote. The volunteers will visit hundreds of patients next Monday -- the day before Election Day -- with necessary applications needed for absentee balloting. The volunteers will then bring the forms to the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder and wait for ballots. The volunteers will distribute the ballots to patients on Election Day, collect them and deliver them to the nearest polling place for counting, Rotter says. "Our volunteers really take pride in being part of our democratic process by helping our patients exercise their right to vote," Rotter says in a statement. "It also means a lot to our patients, who want their voices heard and their votes counted."