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Class Action Lawsuit Filed: Freeway Call Boxes Inaccessible to Deaf Motorists
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April 14, 2005 - The California Association of the Deaf and several individual deaf citizens today filed a class action lawsuit against state and local agencies across California to compel them to make emergency roadside call boxes accessible to deaf and hard of hearing motorists. The lawsuit was filed in the federal court in San Francisco.
Over 16,000 roadside call boxes are maintained by local governmental entities called Service Authorities for Freeway Emergencies (SAFEs), and are answered by dispatchers of the California Highway Patrol (CHP) or private contractors on public rights-of-way controlled by the Department of Transportation (Caltrans). The SAFEs are funded by motor vehicle registration fees.
The defendants named in the class action are the CHP, Caltrans and nine local SAFEs, which collectively operate 5,458 call boxes throughout California. The SAFEs named in the suit are: Capitol Valley Regional SAFE (which serves the counties of El Dorado, Glenn, Sacramento, San Joaquin, Sutter, Yolo and Yuba), Riverside County SAFE, San Bernardino County SAFE, Del Norte County SAFE, Imperial County SAFE, Kern County SAFE, San Benito County SAFE, San Luis Obispo County SAFE, and Santa Barbara County SAFE.
The complaint alleges that the government agencies have violated both state and federal anti-discrimination laws “by effectively denying deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals full and equal access to California highways and roads” because the call boxes are not equipped with non-voice operated, text telecommunications devices (TDDs or TTYs) that would enable deaf motorists to effectively seek medical, police or roadside assistance. Call boxes accessible to the deaf have been available for a number of years, and have been installed by several SAFEs in California that are not named in the lawsuit, including those for Los Angeles, Orange and Ventura Counties.
“The current call boxes operated by the defendant SAFEs prevent deaf and hard of hearing motorists from obtaining emergency services, leaving them stranded on the highways, in dangerous situations and unable to inform dispatchers about the nature and urgency of the emergency and whether an ambulance, a police officer, a tow truck or other help is needed,” said Donald Rosenkjar, president of the California Association of the Deaf. “Two-way communication is also critical so the motorist can be informed what help is on the way, answer any questions the dispatcher may have, and be able to update the dispatcher on the situation.”
The plaintiffs allege that failure to provide call boxes accessible to the deaf violates the federal Americans with Disabilities Act, Title II (ADA), the federal Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and California Government Code section 11135, all of which prohibit discrimination against persons with disabilities in government sponsored or financed public programs and services. The plaintiffs are seeking injunctive and declaratory relief to require the government agencies to install and use TTYs or other devices that allow deaf motorists to type in information and receive typewritten information from the CHP, thus permitting vital two-way communication.
Several other SAFEs who also currently operate call boxes inaccessible to the deaf were not named in the lawsuit because they have agreed to upgrade their boxes with TTY devices. Prior to filing the lawsuit, the plaintiffs’ attorneys sought commitments from all the SAFEs to upgrade their call boxes with TTY devices. As a result of these efforts, a number of SAFEs, which collectively operate 4,538 call boxes, responded with a commitment and board action to install TTY devices in their call boxes. These SAFEs include the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC), which serves the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area, and the SAFE’s for the counties of San Diego, Humboldt, Mendocino, Merced, Monterey, and Santa Cruz.
“We are heartened that so many of the SAFE agencies are finally taking decisive actions to make their call boxes deaf friendly in full compliance with the law,” said Ken Kresse, one of the attorneys for the law firms representing the plaintiffs. “Although we believe that these public agencies should have taken the lead years ago, we nevertheless are pleased, as are our clients, with the recent progress.”
The California Association for the Deaf is a non-profit organization, with headquarters in Los Angeles. Its mission is to enable deaf and hard of hearing people to live independent, productive lives, with full access to the services and opportunities available to the hearing population. Its members reside throughout California, and regularly travel by car on freeways and highways where the defendant SAFEs have call boxes.
The individual plaintiffs in the class action suit are Victoria Munoz of Contra Costa County, Daniel Arellanes of Contra Costa County, Lyle Hinks of Sacramento County and Seymour Bernstein of Riverside County, all of whom are deaf and travel regularly by car on California freeways and roadways.
In an incident described in the lawsuit, Ms. Munoz and Mr. Arellanes were traveling on Highway 242 in Concord, Contra Costa County in August 2002, when their car was smashed by a car wheel wildly careening off the median barrier, injuring them both. Ms. Munoz needed urgent medical treatment. After trying unsuccessfully to flag down another motorist for help, Mr. Arellanes tried to use a nearby call box, which was not equipped with TTY, by simply screaming into the handset, as he does not have intelligible speech. Because he is deaf, Mr. Arellanes could not tell if any dispatcher had heard his screaming or whether help was on the way. After an hour, a CHP officer arrived, but Mr. Arellanes does not know whether the CHP responded to his screaming into the call box, or whether the CHP officer was merely passing by. Because the CHP did not know ahead of time that Ms. Munoz needed an ambulance, she was forced to wait even longer before an ambulance arrived. Ms. Munoz and Mr. Arellanes were stranded on the highway for almost two hours, as night fell, while Ms. Munoz’ injuries went untreated, and she was suffering pain and serious risk to her health.
The class action suit was filed on behalf of the plaintiffs by attorneys from the California Center for Law and the Deaf, located in San Leandro, the Western Law Center for Disability Rights in Los Angeles and the law firm of Morrison & Foerster LLP in San Francisco.
A similar class action was successfully brought in Los Angeles County by the Western Law Center for Disability Rights, on behalf of hearing impaired motorists for whom the County’s call boxes were not accessible. Pursuant to a settlement agreement reached in 1999, Los Angeles County SAFE has upgraded nearly 3,000 call boxes to include TTYs, and has also made them physically accessible to motorists who use wheelchairs. The plaintiffs in the current action hope for a similarly successful result.
Contacts:
Ken Kresse, California Center for Law and the Deaf, 510.483.0922, calclad3@earthlink.net
Carolyn Young, Western Law Cetner for Disability Rights, 213.736.1031, Carolyn.Young@lls.edu
Jessica Miller, Morrison & Foerster, 415.268.6901, jessicamiller@mofo.com
For a Copy of the Complaint Contact:
Janney & Janney Attorney Service, 213.628.6338
Munoz v. Sacramento Area Council of Governments, et al. filed in U.S. District Court, Northern District of California (San Francisco).
Case # 05-01525 JSW
INABILITY TO USE CALL BOX AFTER HIGHWAY CRASH LEADS TO CLASS-ACTION LAWSUIT
By Thaai Walker
Mercury News
After their car crashed on Highway 242 in Concord on a late afternoon in August 2002, Victoria Munoz sat dazed and injured as her friend, Daniel Arellanes, ran to a roadside emergency call box to summon an ambulance.
But there was a problem: Arellanes is deaf. The call box wasn't equipped with text telecommunications devices, known as TDDs or TTYs, that allow the deaf to make phone calls. Frustrated, he screamed unintelligibly into the phone with no way of knowing whether anyone was listening.
Now, Arellanes and Munoz, who is also deaf, are lead plaintiffs in a class-action suit against state and local transportation agencies across California. Officials in the Bay Area already are moving to make emergency call boxes accessible to hearing-impaired motorists, but the suit filed in San Francisco federal court late last week would compel agencies around the state to do the same thing.
"Those call boxes were installed as a life-saving device,'' said Kelby Brick, executive director of law and advocacy at the National Association of the Deaf. "To exclude deaf and hard-of-hearing motorists from the same kind of access is to say that deaf and hard-of-hearing lives are worth less than others.''
The bright yellow call boxes that dot many California roads started showing up in the late 1980s and were installed to aid motorists at times of greatest need. But as the suit filed by Arellanes Munoz points out, they are of little use to deaf motorists.
As a result, their attorneys say, deaf and hard of hearing individuals are denied full and equal access to California's highways and roads -- and that, they say, is a violation of state and federal anti-discrimination laws.
Disability advocates say the legal action is similar to other suits to bring equal access to the disabled, such as the battles to make sidewalk curb cuts mandatory to accommodate people in wheelchairs, and to ensure that public restrooms are accessible to all.
"Each one of those things had to be fought for," said Jennifer Pesek, an attorney with the California Center for Law and the Deaf based in San Leandro. The firm is one of three representing the plaintiffs in the class-action suit.
Along with several counties, the suit also names the California Highway Patrol and the California Department of Transportation as defendants.
The Metropolitan Transportation Commission oversees the 2,600 call boxes in the Bay Area's nine counties, including Contra Costa County, where the accident that led to the lawsuit occurred. Attorneys who filed the suit say the MTC is one of a few agencies that has agreed to carry out the upgrades, but only after litigation was threatened. The others were in San Diego and Santa Cruz.
Munoz who lives in Walnut Creek, said the accident was frightening enough. Not knowing whether help was coming as darkness fell added to the terror.
Deaf Group Sues for Accessible Call Boxes
By John Ryan, LA Daily Journal Staff Writer
April 15, 2005
LOS ANGELES - A group of deaf individuals filed a proposed class action in San Francisco federal court Thursday, claiming that state and county agencies are violating anti-discrimination laws by failing to make roadside call boxes accessible to the deaf.
The plaintiffs want a court order requiring Service Authorities for Freeway Emergencies, county and regional bodies known as SAFEs, to equip their call boxes with text devices that allow deaf people to communicate with law-enforcement and emergency personnel.
The suit names as defendants nine local SAFEs as well as the California Highway Patrol and Caltrans. There are 17 SAFE agencies in California.
"The law is very clear that you cannot have government services and programs that discriminate against people on the basis of a disability," said Patricia Mar of Morrison & Foerster, which is representing the plaintiffs pro bono. "There are emergency call boxes that are very important to motorists that do have these [text] devices."
But an official for the Capitol Valley Regional SAFE in Sacramento called the lawsuit "premature." Joan Medeiros, a deputy executive director of the group, said state call boxes will be switching from analog to digital technology in the coming year. Medeiros said adding the text devices would be cheaper when the boxes go through the technological conversion. "It makes more sense to convert them at the same time because its saves labor," Medeiros said. "We have the practical realities of a limited budget." She said she asked the plaintiffs' lawyers to hold off on the suit until her agency votes on whether to add the text devices, a decision expected later this month.
Ken Kresse, the executive director of the California Center for Law and the Deaf, which is co-counsel on the case, said that many local SAFEs around the state were not sued because they have agreed to incorporate text devices into their call boxes. Kresse expected that some defendants would be dropped from the suit once they make a similar pledge. He also accused the SAFEs of generally taking no action until faced with the prospect of a lawsuit. "We are trying to work with these folks," Kresse said.
He said the plaintiffs sued the Highway Patrol and Caltrans because the state agencies have to approve motorist-aid systems. "We believe that Caltrans and CHP should have taken a leadership role and pushed this issue, but they haven't," Kresse said. Public-affairs representatives with the state agencies did not respond to inquiries on the suit.
Named plaintiffs Victoria Munoz and Daniel Arellanes claim in the suit that they were left virtually helpless after another car struck theirs on Highway 242 in Concord. Arellanes tried to help Munoz, who was seriously hurt, but he could not tell whether a dispatcher had heard what he said into a call-box receiver, according to the suit. Both plaintiffs are deaf, and Arellanes does not have intelligible speech.
A highway patrol officer eventually showed up, but because he had been unaware of the nature of the problem, had not called for an ambulance. That forced Munoz to wait two hours for medical treatment, according to the lawsuit.
Deaf people often are forced to flag down other cars for help, which can be dangerous, or to walk to the nearest residence, the plaintiffs' lawyers said. Mar said that inadequate call boxes affect more than just the deaf individuals who are unlucky enough to get into a serious accident on the road. "Deaf motorists drive with insecurity and concern, knowing that if they get into an accident, they will not have the same access to the call boxes," she said.
The plaintiffs, which include the California Association of the Deaf, an advocacy group, allege violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act and state anti-discrimination laws.
The state has 16,000 call boxes. The nine SAFEs sued are responsible for 5,458 call boxes. Kresse said the class size could reach 160,000, given a conservative estimate of the number of deaf drivers in the state. He added that the text-equipped call boxes also would help hard-of-hearing and speech-impaired individuals.
Carolyn Young, a co-counsel on the case from the Western Law Center for Disability Rights, noted that her group brought a similar class action in Los Angeles County. The case settled in 1999, leading to text-device upgrades of 3,000 call boxes in the county. "We're hoping for the same results across the state," Young said.
Thursday's suit was announced at a press conference in the Los Angeles office of Morrison & Foerster.
Hearing-impaired call boxes hard sell for some counties
Scott Vanhorne, Staff Writer, Inland Valley Daily Bulletin
April 15, 2005 Friday
Roadside lifelines for stranded motorists have become an albatross for San Bernardino County's transportation agency as it struggles to maintain call boxes along 1,706 miles of highways with limited funds.
Things got harder Thursday when advocates for the hearing impaired filed a class-action lawsuit in U.S. District Court in San Francisco against San Bernardino, Riverside and seven other counties because their call boxes are not equipped with keyboards for disabled drivers.
The California Association of the Deaf and four hearing impaired people claim the boxes violate federal law by not providing equal access.
San Bernardino Associated Governments, the county's transportation agency also known as Sanbag, gets about $1.5 million a year from a $1 vehicle registration fee to pay for the phones.
It began upgrading 1,615 call boxes from analog to digital technology this year because the latter will soon become obsolete.
The $2.4 million fix will whittle Sanbag's call box reserves to about $350,000. The agency plans to spend about $1.6 million to retrofit the phones with keyboards for the hearing impaired, but it could take up to eight years to do that.
"We will be doing it as soon as we can generate the money for it," Sanbag spokeswoman Cheryl Donahue said.
Meanwhile, other more populous Southern California counties get so much from the $1 registration fee that they can offer free roadside assistance to stranded motorists in addition to phones.
For the past two years, San Diego County has paid $400,000 from its fund for a rescue and firefighting helicopter and still has about $12 million in reserve.
"I totally understand San Bernardino's situation," said Ken Coleman, who manages Los Angeles County's call box program. "You are in a Catch-22 because you have a huge amount of area to cover."
Jennifer Pesek, an attorney for the California Center for Law and the Deaf, agrees smaller counties are shortchanged on call box funding. "It certainly would be more fair if it was a statewide issue," she said.
Thirty-four counties out of the state's 58 participate in the call box program.
Lawmakers could change the funding scheme set up in the law so all the counties can dip into the same pool of money. But getting the change would be a difficult battle, said Paul Biane, county supervisor and chairman of the Sanbag board of directors. "Those larger, metro areas like San Diego County are going to fight for those dollars to stay in their counties," he said.
Pesek said counties named in the lawsuit have had several years to upgrade their call boxes for the hearing impaired. "The problem that we had with a number of [counties] is that they said they would look into it, but nothing happened," she said.
Sanbag contends hearing impaired motorists can summon help with its roadside phones. The motorists tap on the receiver. This alerts an operator, who dispatches a California Highway Patrol officer.
"They are given top priority," Donahue said.
But Pesek said the system still isn't equitable.
What if the driver urgently needs an ambulance or firefighters? Tapping won't work, she said. "It leaves the possibility that people could be in grave danger," she said.
San Bernardino and Riverside counties operate call box programs through the same call center. Since February 2002, operators received two calls from hearing impaired motorists in Riverside County. Both occurred within the past five weeks, and each time CHP officers could not find the caller, Donahue said.
The CHP, which ran the program from 1987 to 2002, did not keep detailed caller statistics, Donahue said. On average, about 40,000 people use call boxes each year in San Bernardino County. The numbers have dwindled over the years as cellular phones become commonplace.
Scott Vanhorne can be reached at [909] 386-3878.
Copyright 2005 MediaNews Group, Inc.
Inland Valley Daily Bulletin (Ontario, CA)
Class-Action Suit Seeks Call Boxes Equipped for Deaf
Two agencies and 15 counties are cited in bid to add teletypewriters to the roadside equipment.
By Susana Enriquez, Times Staff Writer
When a tire flew across the freeway and smashed into his car, Daniel Arellanes quickly parked, left his injured girlfriend and ran across several lanes of traffic toward a call box in a desperate attempt to get help.
Being deaf, and noticing that the box was not equipped with a teletypewriter, Arellanes tried yelling into the phone and banging the headset against the box, thinking the noise would draw help.
Finally, he left the phone off the hook.
The California Highway Patrol arrived one hour later — whether intentionally or by chance is unclear — and it took another hour for a tow truck and ambulance to arrive.
Arellanes and Victoria Munoz, who is also deaf, are plaintiffs in a class-action suit, filed in April in San Francisco, that aims to widen the use of teletypewriters, or TTYs, in highway call boxes.
"I didn't get upset until after waiting an hour," Munoz said in an interview through a relay operator. "I got panic and anxiety worrying about internal bleeding."
The suit names the state Department of Transportation and its director, the CHP and its commissioner, and 15 counties as defendants.
In those counties, from Del Norte in the north to Imperial in the south, nearly all 5,458 call boxes are inaccessible to deaf and hard-of-hearing motorists.
"We feel that it's pretty clear that a call box isn't completely accessible unless it has a TTY," said Jennifer Pesek, an attorney for the California Center for Law and the Deaf, one of the law firms handling the case.
Throughout California, more than 16,000 of the yellow call boxes line the highways. Of those, 6,246 are accessible to the deaf and hard-of-hearing in Ventura, Los Angeles and Orange counties.
A national call box standard does not exist, Pesek said, and because each county administers its own call boxes, it is difficult to get consistent service.
"Right now, it's a state-by-state issue," Pesek said. "We are hoping — it seems pretty likely — that in three or four years we will have a national regulation."
The U.S. Access Board, a federal agency, is reviewing a regulation that would call on states to upgrade call boxes with TTYs.
In general, call boxes are solar-powered cellular phones with a link to the CHP. Services are funded in participating counties by a $1 fee assessed by the Department of Motor Vehicles on vehicle registration.
Because call boxes are a public service, the lawsuit argues, people with disabilities cannot be denied access to them. Doing so violates both federal and California law, the suit contends.
"[Having] TTYs on the call boxes would make it easier for us all," Munoz said. "I have three deaf children and one hard-of-hearing grandchild. I don't want the same to happen to them."
The Metropolitan Transportation Commission, which comprises nine counties in the Bay Area, decided to upgrade its 2,650 call boxes so it would not be named in the lawsuit, said Kenneth Kao, program coordinator for the Bay Area's Service Authority for Freeways and Expressways.
The commission includes Contra Costa County, where the accident involving Munoz and Arellanes occurred.
Santa Cruz, Monterey and San Diego counties also are planning to upgrade call boxes, Pesek said.
The Kern Council of Governments, one of the defendants in the suit, is beginning the process of modifying its 574 call boxes.
"We've been working on this a number of years," said Darrel Hildebrand, assistant director of the council. "We were accumulating the money to do the work."
The council's governing board is scheduled to vote today on whether to appropriate up to $1.65 million to add TTYs to call boxes in the county and upgrade them from analog technology to digital.
In order for a county to be dismissed from the suit, the Center for Law and the Deaf is asking county officials to agree to install TTY technology and set a timetable of about 12 to 18 months for doing so.
"We are prepared to go to court if we need to," Pesek said. "But we're really hoping for a resolution."
In 1996, Ventura County spent $325,000 to install TTY equipment on its 550 call boxes. "We've been trying to take a proactive approach on disabled issues," said Kerry Forsythe, deputy director for the Ventura County Transportation Commission.
Los Angeles County took a reactive approach in 1999 when, in response to a lawsuit by four disabled people, it spent $4 million to make its 4,470 call boxes accessible to the deaf and disabled.
Orange County, acting to avoid a possible suit, finished equipping its 1,226 call boxes with TTYs in 2002. The project cost $3 million.
May 19, 2005 Latimes.com
Lawsuit targets road call boxes
Plaintiffs say call boxes in nine areas statewide - including Sacramento - violate state and federal anti-discrimination laws because they do not include text telecommunication devices, commonly known as TDD or TTY equipment. The lack of equipment "effectively (denies) deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals full and equal access to California highways and roads," according to the complaint.
"If you're a deaf person driving the freeways, you don't have the security of knowing those call boxes are available if you need one for a medical emergency, mechanical breakdown or police assistance," said Patricia Mar, one of the attorneys for the plaintiffs.
More than 15,000 call boxes are installed on state freeways, according to the California Department of Transportation. The roadside yellow boxes are maintained by local government agencies called Service Authorities for Freeways and Expressways, or SAFEs. Calls are answered by the California Highway Patrol.
The lawsuit targets 5,458 call boxes maintained by nine local operators, including Capitol Valley Regional SAFE, which serves El Dorado, Sacramento, San Joaquin, Sutter, Yolo and Yuba counties. The CHP and Caltrans also are named defendants.
The class-action case was filed April 14 in U.S. District Court in San Francisco by attorneys for the California Association of the Deaf and several deaf individuals. The lawsuit seeks an injunction ordering SAFEs to install TTY equipment that would permit deaf motorists to send and receive typewritten information from CHP dispatchers.
Call box systems are funded by a $1 fee on vehicle registrations. The Capitol Valley Regional SAFE has about 1,500 call boxes, said Deputy Executive Director Joan Medeiros of the Sacramento Area Council of Governments, which manages the program.
When installation in the Sacramento region began in 1994, the phones included technology that requires a deaf caller to tap the receiver until a light flashes, indicating a dispatcher has received the call. The caller then simply hangs up and waits for a CHP officer to arrive.
Critics said rudimentary communication is inadequate for freeway emergencies. The system used by SAFEs named in the lawsuit leaves deaf and hard-of-hearing motorists "stranded on the highways, in dangerous situations and unable to inform dispatchers about the nature and urgency of the emergency and whether an ambulance, a police officer, a tow truck or other help is needed," said Donald Rosenkjar, president of the California Association of the Deaf.
Los Angeles County SAFE has upgraded almost 3,000 call boxes to include TTY devices to settle a similar class-action lawsuit, according to the Western Law Center for Disability Rights. Humboldt, Mendocino, Merced, Monterey, San Diego and Santa Clara counties, and SAFEs serving nine counties in the San Francisco Bay Area, also have agreed to update their call boxes with equipment for deaf motorists, attorneys said.
Medeiros said SACOG has been discussing the issue with plaintiffs in the current lawsuit. She said Capitol Valley Regional SAFE plans to add TTY equipment to all its call boxes as the system is converted from analog to digital technology by 2007.
Staff will present a recommendation and schedule for revamping the call boxes at a SACOG board meeting May 19, Medeiros said. For each box, the cost is estimated at $1,000 for TTY equipment and $1,200 for digital conversion, she said.
Other SAFEs named in the lawsuit serve Del Norte, Imperial, Kern, Riverside, San Benito, San Bernardino, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties. Most have indicated they also plan to upgrade their systems for deaf motorists, although final decisions are pending, said Ken Kresse of the California Center for Law and the Deaf, another attorney for the plaintiffs.
Freeway call-box programs in California are preparing to spend millions of dollars on technology improvements, despite declining demand as more motorists take their cell phones on the road.
With more than 15,000 call boxes statewide, operators are scrambling to meet a 2007 deadline for new telecommunications requirements. In addition, a federal lawsuit filed last month, which seeks class-action status, could require all call boxes to add TTY devices for motorists with hearing disabilities.
Meanwhile, usage of the roadside yellow boxes has plummeted, a trend widely attributed to proliferating cell phones. In Los Angeles County, monthly calls fell from a peak of 80,000 in the early 1990s to 10,000 recently.
Nevertheless, supporters said, call boxes remain a vital service for travelers who have no other link to assistance, especially on isolated rural roads. In addition, funding for the program helps support other transportation improvements, officials said.
With 4,000 call boxes, the Los Angeles County Service Authority for Freeways and Expressways operates the biggest call-box system in the state. The program costs $2 million annually.
"We're providing at the minimum a lifeline service for those who don't have a cell phone," said Byron Lee of the Los Angeles County SAFE.
"Ten thousand calls a month is a lot of calls."
Spaced a quarter-mile to two miles apart, call boxes line about 6,300 miles of highways in more than half of California's 58 counties.
The solar-powered phones are maintained by local SAFEs with funding from a $1 fee on vehicle registrations.
Calls are answered by the California Highway Patrol or privately contracted dispatchers. Some SAFEs also help fund freeway service patrols, which roam local highways during commute hours to help stalled motorists.
SAFEs face new funding issues as they upgrade call boxes from analog to digital signals within two years to meet new standards in the telecommunications industry. In Los Angeles County, the conversion cost is estimated at $8 million, Lee said.
Local operators are studying ways to balance the cost of service with declining call-box usage, said Kenneth Kao of CalSAFE, a statewide group.
In the San Francisco Bay Area, the Metropolitan Transportation Commission last year removed 900 call boxes by increasing spacing on some freeways from a quarter-mile to three-quarters of a mile.
Other ideas include beefing up freeway service patrols.
The MTC will spend $5.6 million to convert its remaining 2,650 call boxes to digital technology and TTY devices, Kao said.
By agreeing to install equipment for deaf callers, the agency avoided being sued in a federal case alleging call boxes in nine areas violate anti-discrimination laws because they lack text telecommunication devices for hard-of-hearing motorists.
One of the defendants, Capitol Valley Regional SAFE, operates 1,500 call boxes in El Dorado, Sacramento, San Joaquin, Sutter, Yolo and Yuba counties. The Sacramento Area Council of Governments, or SACOG, which manages SAFE, plans to add TTY and convert the phones to digital signals at the same time.
The total estimated cost is $3.3 million.
Calls on Capitol Valley's system have dropped steadily from about 72,000 annually in 1995, the first full year of operation, to 25,600 last year.
The operating cost is $1.3 million annually.
Despite declining usage, "upward of 20,000 people a year still using the service is significant," said SACOG Executive Director Mike McKeever. In addition, he said, call-box funding also supports freeway service patrols and attracts matching federal dollars for SACOG's Intelligent Transportation Systems program, which provides freeway ramp meters, reader boards on highways and traffic-control systems that optimize traffic signals in the capital and Sacramento County.
"Because of the way this funding is structured, we would lose access to other important transportation related program funds if we decided to shut down the call boxes," McKeever said.
He said that only the Legislature can change funding for call boxes.
Meanwhile, call boxes remain essential security tools for travelers who don't have cell phones. Ken Kresse of the California Center for Law and the Deaf, which filed the federal lawsuit, noted that deaf motorists don't use cell phones.
Many rely on e-mail pagers, he said, although signal coverage is spotty in isolated areas.
Sacramento County resident Lyle Hinks, a plaintiff in the lawsuit, was driving with two young sons when a flat tire stranded them on Highway 99 near Fresno.
Unable to use a call box without TTY equipment and concerned about walking with his children, they waited in 100-degree weather for four hours before a motorist stopped to help.
"As I look at it, under the Americans with Disabilities Act, if the call boxes are available to the general public, then they should be made available to me and to other deaf and hard-of-hearing people," Hinks said.
"Not only because it is my right, but also because it's for my safety and for the safety of whoever rides with me."