Cell lobby claiming complaints about car use don't ring true.

There's no shortage of rhetoric in the arguments for and against state legislation outlawing the use of handheld cell phones while driving.

Math, however, is another story.

Cost estimates of cell-phone related automobile accidents are so wildly divergent as to be almost unusable. Some estimates put the cost to the state at about $260 million. Others say that medical costs, property damage, down time and pain and suffering run as high as several billion dollars.

"I have applied a common sense cost/benefit analysis," said Assemblyman Joe Simitian, D-Palo Alto, who authored legislation passed by the Assembly on May 29. "There's nothing in the bill that prevents someone from talking on the cell phone 24 hours a day, given the hands-free technology out there. So I see zero loss of productivity."

Simitian classified the bill's savings in health care, safety response and property costs as "extraordinary," but declined to estimate a figure.

Meanwhile, cell phone lobbyists say that cost considerations miss the point.

"I don't think this is about whether we are going to lose revenues or not," said Jim Gross, a lobbyist for T-Mobile USA, a unit of Deutsche Telekom, which opposes the bill. "It's about whether cell phones should be targeted as the most significant distraction on the road."

Over the next two weeks, expect the debate over the cost-benefit of cell phone legislation to heat up -- spurred by intense lobbying efforts on both sides. Five undecided Democrats on the Senate transportation committee could hold the bill's fate. They are Liz Figueroa, D-Fremont, Dean Florez, D-Shafter, Betty Karnette, D-Long Beach, Don Perata, D-East Bay, and Jack Scott, D-Pasadena.

Spokesmen for Scott and Figueroa said their bosses hadn't yet focused in on the issue. The others did not return calls.

"There is going to be an intense lobbying effort, no question about it," said Randall Henry, principal consultant to the committee, which will hear arguments on the bill before it moves to the full Senate.

Lobbying blitz

The current hands-free legislation is the first ever to pass the Assembly and reach the Senate. Two previous bills, also sponsored by Simitian, stalled in the Assembly.

This time around, the industry appears to have saved its fire for the Senate after passage by the Assembly became inevitable. "I suspect most of lobbyists will now put their efforts into the Senate," Simitian said.

Leading the drive against the current bill are Sprint PCS Group, Nextel Communications Inc. and T-Mobile USA Inc., a unit of Deutsche Telecom.

If the measure passes, California would become only the second state in the country, after New York, to require that drivers use headsets or earphones to keep both hands free while driving.

Opponents say the legislation is flawed because it singles out cell phones as the only distraction that can be punishable with a $20 fine for first offenders and $50 thereafter.

"To ban cell phones and not ban eating ice cream or smoking or yelling at your kids doesn't fix the problem," said state Sen. Kevin Murray, D-Los Angeles, who chairs the Senate transportation committee.

But Michael Bagley, director of public policy for Verizon Wireless, which backs the measure, said the bill is more palatable than other proposals around the country that ban cell phones outright while driving. Such legislation is the outgrowth of an increasingly contentious debate over the safety of driving and using a cell phone at the same time.

Just last week, the National Transportation Safety Board recommended that novice drivers be prohibited from using cell phones -- including the hands-free variety -- but stopped short of suggesting broader restrictions because there is not enough scientific data available.

Actually, there's been considerable research on the subject - it's that legislators don't quite know what to make of the numbers.

Measuring the Impact

Cell phones contributed to 611 of more than 491,000 California crashes during the first six months of 2002, about one tenth of 1 percent, according a California Highway Patrol study released in February. That figure is consistent with a national report by the University of North Carolina Highway Safety Research Center in 2001.

With economic costs of statewide car accidents estimated at $20.7 billion in 2000 (the most recent year available), according to the U.S. Department of Transportation, the share associated with cell phone use would come to $257 million.

That is probably low, according to Joshua Cohen, senior research associate at Harvard Center for Risk Analysis, who published a report earlier this year that found cell phone use causes between 2 percent and 6 percent of all vehicle accidents.

"When people get into crashes and they're not severely injured, they're not going to go out of there way to admit they were on the phone," said Cohen.

Cohen's report found that a complete ban on cell phones, with no allowance for hands-free devices, would save the nation about $43 billion in accident-related costs. Accidents in California account for 9 percent of the nationwide total, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation, making the state's share about $3.9 billion.

The impact of the Simitian bill is less clear. There have been no studies estimating what percentage of cell phone accidents would be prevented by hands-free technology.

While New York's law requiring a hands-free device for drivers went into effect last March, no cost savings or accident reduction data have been compiled.

"It has been effective, but we don't have the figures on how it's decreased," said Assemblyman Felix Oritz, D-Brooklyn, who authored the bill, the first of its kind in the country.

Still, in the 10 months between the law's effective date and the end of last year, the state is projecting $9.6 million in annualized revenues from the $100 tickets issued to violators. California has 20 million licensed drivers, nearly twice the number in New York.

Due to the lack of conclusive figures on cell phone use, legislators may be putting the cart before the horse, said Cohen.

"It's frustrating that they're imposing a ban on hand-held devices when there isn't the science to back up the idea that such a ban will reduce risk in the way they hope it will," he said. "Legislatures have an easier time making laws than trying to figure out what should be done given the available science."

[GRAPH OMITTED]

Leading Interference

Causes of collisions for six months ended June 30, 2002.

                                  Percent of
Distraction           Collisions    Total

Cell phones              611         11
Radio/CD                 519          9
Children                 234          4
Eating                   207          3
Reading                  112          2
Smoking                   72          1
Electronics               71          1
Animals                   51          1
Personal Hygiene          22         >1
Other Distractions *   3,778         67

* Includes inattention factors such as daydreaming, visual distractions,
street signs and drivers saying they weren't paying attention.

Source: California Highway Patrol