Media Contact: Toshia JohnsonTel. 310-423-4767E-mail: [email protected]
LOS ANGELES (October 6, 2000) -- By the time polls close on Nov. 7, hundreds of voters will have cast their ballots despite being confined to a hospital bed, spending the day undergoing diagnostic tests, or being treated in the emergency room at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.
In a tradition that dates back nearly a quarter century, a small army of volunteers and staff members will take on two days of added responsibility to make sure every patient on every unit has an opportunity to vote. Because the logistics are complicated – even with practice every four years – planning and preparations have been two months in the making.
According to Barbara Colner, Director of the Volunteer Services Department, ensuring complete coverage throughout the hospital is a time-consuming challenge that requires the participation and coordination of numerous departments, including the Emergency Department, Admitting, Nursing, Admissions, Hospitality and Patient Relations.
Absentee voting is a two-stage process. Interested voters must first complete an application for an absentee ballot. Therefore, the task on Monday, the day before the election, is to visit each patient, record each name on log sheets, and note whether a ballot is requested or refused.
Beginning at 12:01 a.m. on Monday, new patients coming in through Admitting have an opportunity to request a ballot. At about 5 a.m. that day, a few volunteers begin offering the applications to incoming morning surgery patients. Most of the participating volunteers – about 20 in all – meet at 9 a.m. in the Volunteer workroom, which is transformed into “Voting Headquarters.” Each volunteer is assigned to a particular nursing unit that will be his or her responsibility during the two-day process.
“Voting from a hospital bed is slightly different from voting at a polling place,” according to Allison Rotter, Manager of the Volunteer Services Department. “For one thing, patients sometimes need help filling out the application and ballot forms. To ensure continuity and confidentiality, each volunteer who participates is handpicked and must commit to following the process through from beginning to end. The patients feel more comfortable dealing with one person, and we select volunteers who have enough flexibility in their schedules to allow them to commit to such a large block of time.”
After each patient has had an opportunity to sign up or decline and all of the volunteers have returned to Voting Headquarters, the applications are given to a designated, reliable Cedars-Sinai employee who delivers them to the Registrar Recorder’s office in Norwalk. The following morning, Election Day, the same employee picks up the actual ballots and takes them to Cedars-Sinai’s Voting Headquarters.
Volunteers take the ballots to their assigned nursing units, delivering them to patients to be filled out and sealed. Having agreed to maintain total confidentiality, the volunteers may help patients who are unable to complete the ballots on their own and have no family members to assist. The ballots are then collected and later dropped off at the appropriate polling places.
“We offer this opportunity to every patient who is in-house, every patient,” stressed Colner. “It’s a big undertaking but it’s the right thing to do and it fits into the mission of the hospital to always offer compassion and caring. Some of the same volunteers help every four years because they feel it is important to give the patients this opportunity.”
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