Elgin's Latino and Lao groups encouraged to vote early Saturday

Editor's note: this story has been updated with the correct spelling of Aida Palma's name.

Jason Cortes won't be eligible to vote for another three years, yet he's been putting time and effort into making sure Latinos who can vote will. Why? "Because my future is their hands," said Jason, a sophomore at Dundee-Crown High School in Carpentersville.

Gabriel Cabrera, a senior at Elgin High School, agreed. "Since I can't vote, I would like someone from the same background, my Hispanic background, to be able to represent our voice. I want them to go out there to try to make a change for our community."

The two are among 15 local high school students who've been knocking on doors since last month as part of the New Americans Democracy Project, an effort by the Illinois Coalition of Immigrant and Refugee Rights to get immigrant communities in Chicago and the suburbs to participate in the electoral process.

Locally, the coalition partners with Centro de Informacion in Elgin to carry out the initiative. Volunteers give out information about how and where to vote, and helped people to register before the deadline earlier this month. In Illinois, you can also register to vote at the polls on Election Day, Nov. 8.

There also is a push to get people to vote early on Saturday at Gail Borden Public Library at 270 N. Grove Ave., Elgin, for what's been dubbed the "Latinos Votamos Juntos/Latinos Vote Together" campaign.

"A lot of our community members don't even know that early voting is an option," said coalition member Aida Palma, who's been working with Centro since late August.

Volunteers from the Lao American Organization of Elgin also are encouraging the community to vote on Saturday at the Elgin library if they live in Kane County, and at village hall, 301 Irving Park Road in Streamwood, if they live in Cook County.

"We do this every election," said Chin Keomuongchanh, the Lao organization's civic engagement program director. "But it seems like (this one) is just so contested, and we just need to educate people more, and get people to start getting involved more and more."

Some voters don't realize there are more than two presidential candidates, and others aren't aware that state races are also on the ballot, Palma said. A large part of the work is providing voters with information about where the candidates stand on issues important to immigrant communities, such as the minimum wage, access to health care and scholarships for undocumented students, she said.

The effort is nonpartisan, Palma said.

"We give information about what people have said about the issues that matter to our communities. We are not promoting any candidate," she said. "We put the information in accessible language. We put it at people's doorsteps, in their hands, so they can make their decision."