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7.5 million Floridians still have landline telephones in their homes, but the number is falling fast. In Florida last year a million people canceled their landline service. As Whitney Ray tells us, the trend is changing the way pollsters collect data, telemarketers sell and police officers respond to emergencies.

87-year old Angela Thornton has two phones. A cell phone for emergencies and a landline she might cancel. Angela says about half the calls she gets on her landline are from telemarketers.

“It’s a pain when they call and advertise and talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. Whatever. I usually just hang up on them,” said Angelina.

Last year a million Floridians cut their landlines, while the number of cell phones in use continues to grow. Today 16 million Floridians are using cell phones…

And it shows when there’s an accident. 911 dispatchers can get a hundred calls reporting one wreck. And when it comes to pinpointing the location, newer cell phones can narrow it down to a few feet.

“With the newer cell phones we can put with in a couple of feet where you are at if we have the right information,” said Lt. Bill Fair, with the Leon County Sheriff’s Office.

The rising number of cell phones and falling number of landlines is also changing the way political pollsters conduct surveys, although some still only call landlines. But with one in five households relying solely on cell phone to make calls, the data can be flawed.

In 2009 Quinnipiac pollsters began including cell phone users in their surveys. The switch has made surveys harder to conduct, but the results are a better reflection of the state’s political appetite. Landlines are following the trend of payphones. The latest statistics from 2009 show there’s only 16,500 payphones left in Florida.