This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon: August 18, 2008 - Yeah, I'm here. No, I'm not doing anything. Just driving.
Except of course driving is something, and a very dangerous something with cell phone to ear, according to an alderman in Town and Country.
Recently, John Hoffmann introduced a bill that would make it illegal to talk on a handheld cell phone and text message while driving through town.
The bill died right away, but Hoffman plans to bring it back again, sooner or later.
Currently, there's a ban on handheld phones in California, Connecticut, Washington D.C., New Jersey, New York and Washington, and some jurisdictions in Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Mexico, Ohio and Pennsylvania. Alaska, Minnesota, New Jersey and Washington also have text messaging bans while driving, according to the Governors Highway Safety Association.
Hoffman cites studies linking decreased attention on the road to phone use, and that increases dangerous driving, he says.
"There isn't one study that says all the other studies are wrong."
Views differ, however, from support of the ban to dismissing cell phones as just another driving distraction.
DRIVING WHILE IN-TALK-ICATED
Dick Luedke talks on the phone while driving, sometimes.
"I have pulled over to the side of the road though," says the spokesman for State Farm Insurance Agency in Bloomington, Ill.
Hoffmann says his cell phone is turned off while he's driving.
But the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates that in 2007, 6 percent of drivers used cell phones while driving. And at any time during the day, that means more than 1 million people are driving and talking, according to a survey the NHTSA conducts each year.
They report that talking while driving can "pose a serious cognitive distraction and degrade driver performance."
They've conducted no studies on cell phone use specifically, but report that distractions in general cause 25 percent of crashes.
It gets worse.
A June 2006 study from psychologists from the University of Utah tested 40 drivers under a variety of conditions. Drivers used a driving simulator while talking on a cell phone, while using a hands-free cell phone, with a .08 blood alcohol level and while undistracted. And they concluded that people on cell phones and hands-free phones were as impaired as the drunk drivers.
"If legislators really want to address driver distraction, then they should consider outlawing cell phone use while driving," one of the psychologists said in a press release.
DISTRACTIONS, DISTRACTIONS
State Farm discourages policy holders and drivers in general from talking on the phone, but it's just one of many distractions, Luedke says.
Those include reading the newspaper on your morning commute, putting on makeup, drinking coffee and eating.
Ken Sears agrees. The executive director of the Missouri State Trooper Association has driven from Columbia to Jefferson City for the past 15 years and says he's seen people do just about everything in their cars, including getting dressed
"It's just another distraction."
But it's also a way many people manage their lives now, Sears says, from wrapping up business meetings on the way home to keeping track of families.
He doesn't make calls while on the road, but he does answer them.
"You even see police officers using cell phones while they're driving," he says.
'CUT OFF, RUN OVER AND HIT FROM BEHIND'
State Farm imposes no penalties on drivers if cell phones were a factor in an accident.
But Gloria Ripley of Lake Saint Louis thinks that police should. "We all know you can't do two things at the same time," she says.
Ripley, a retired architect, works part-time at Heavenly Stitches, a bridal shop in Town and Country.
One year ago, she says she was sideswiped while driving, and she's pretty sure the other driver was on a cell.
"I think it's a good idea," Ripley says of the ban, "because I've been cut off and run over and hit from behind."
Hoffmann's bill would have allowed hands-free cell phone use but banned texting, and he isn't the only one in the state to propose banning cell phone use while driving.
State Rep. Talibdin El-Amin, D-St. Louis, proposed a statewide ban on using cell phones while driving. The bill died, but like Hoffmann, he's reportedly said he'll try again.
The Missouri State Trooper Association has no official position on the matter, Sears said, though he does think texting is the most dangerous.
Regardless, he said those kind of laws would be hard to enforce. Unlike enforcing speed limits, which relies on a mechanical device, Sears says enforcing cell phone laws would depend on what officers see, and might involve accessing people's cell phone records, which could be costly.
But he does like Ripley's idea.
She thinks the penalties should come when someone causes an accident and they're on a cell phone.
Littering laws carry heavy fines and had an ad campaign to notify the public. Sears thinks cell phone laws would have to be as serious to get the public to comply.
If the tickets cost only $10 like some seat belt violations, he says, who cares?
Ripley doesn't talk on her phone and drive, by the way. But she does engage in another distraction.
"I put lipstick on while I'm in the car," she says. "I'll admit it. But you know what? I never look in the mirror."
Currently, there are no plans to ban applying lipstick while driving.
Kristen Hare is a freelance writer in Lake St. Louis.