A slow and painful death of land surveying

[mpallamary]

It is indeed degrading when we are being compared with Uber drivers. It is being called "progress." And why there is no rebuttal?

"In the particular case of land surveying, I suspect that progress will be fairly rapid — and painful. I don’t know whether Vizaline will win its case, but I can confidently predict that the market for surveyors will eventually be disrupted. The major disruption will come when the big banks move. When those who finance big projects and big houses decide that a report that relies on GPS mapping is sufficient to mark the metes and bounds of a property, the rising tide of demand will swamp local regulatory resistance."

"Progress often isn’t fun, but that’s how it works."

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles ... h-startups

[Lee Hixson]

It's ludicrous that the Bloomberg author would equate the location of utility company facilities with the location of property lines relative to fence lines. Either he failed to sufficiently research his article or he's consciously turning a blind eye to the complexities of boundary surveying in order to preserve his take on the issue.

[mpallamary]

Agreed! So why doesn't CLSA send a letter in response? Why are we not doing something about this? We are viewed by Bloomberg as lower than Uber drivers. Why isn't anyone objecting? Is anyone protecting the profession?

Does anyone care? Should our efforts be focused on the best spray paint to use and the size of pipes, topics that seem to draw more attention?

[Lee Hixson]

I did:

Mr. Carter…

Your Bloomberg Opinion is based on a fundamental misunderstanding of land surveying. Yes, there are some aspects of the profession that conceivably can be co-opted by non-professionals without major complications, a la the example of the utility company needing their poles and other facilities located.

But that is an entirely different animal from your lead example: “heading out to the lot and mapping what the law calls the metes and bounds, just to be sure that what will soon be your fence isn’t encroaching on the neighbor’s property — or vice versa.”

It’s about required accuracy. A power pole only needs to be located to within 3 or 4 feet of its position in order to fulfill the needs of the utility company. And that is strictly for inventory purposes—there is NO element involved of the “legal” position of those facilities. None at all.

Preparing a map that shows the position of a fence relative to the legal position of the property line in question is categorically different. There are legions of court cases where inches matter. Fortunes have been lost over fights between land owners over where the property line really (“legally”) is located.

A “moderately tech-savvy” bank employee trying to plot a metes & bounds legal description is a law suit begging to happen. You don’t know what you’re talking about to equate the two.

Either you didn’t talk with enough knowledgeable people during your research phase, or you turned a blind eye to the counter argument in order to preserve your take on the issue.

You’ve bitten off more than you can chew.

Regards, Lee Hixson

(Obviously, I titled my comments in places for effect, taking into account the naivete of the lay audience.)

[mpallamary]

EXCELLENT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am preparing an article for The American Surveyor as a call to arms.

EXCELLENT! You made my day!

[bimmel]

The article is definitely enough to infuriate a land surveyor.
I did have a pretty good laugh when I saw the example report though.

[cwesterlund]

I'm not quite sure I understand what the "survey" before purchasing a property is for really. So they want a full blown boundary and records are filed with county or do they simply want the delineation of the property for an acreage? I'm assuming Mississippi Banks are different than California when it comes to buying a house. Parcel quest provides a closed figure and essentially does this and I wouldn't say they are surveying. What am I missing? I read the article and I'm not upset by it I just think the person that wrote it simply is uneducated in land surveying. You can't just take a metes and bounds description, plot the courses and distances and call it good. An analysis needs to be implemented, also not all properties are described by metes and bounds. I think the article warrants a response not because it's belittling to what we do but more so because it's written by someone who is clearly uninformed.

[mpallamary]

With all due respect, it makes no difference whatsoever how any of us feel about what is being done. That is absolutely meaningless and entirely irrelevant. In the public eye, our opinion means the least.

What is important and the ONLY THING THAT MATTERS, is how the public sees us. We are talking about a Bloomberg article. Our profession has been radically attacked and in the eyes of the consumer, our services are essentially worthless. For anyone who doesn't see this as important it naive and dare I say, foolish. So many surveyors thump their chest and say they will never take boundary work away from us. Guess what? They just did.

Boundary is the last vestige of pure surveying and we are being replaced by Uber drivers who will provide survey maps to their customers.

There is no profession unless everyone stands up and protests.

What are you doing to protect the profession?

What is CLSA doing to protect the profession besides passing plaques around?

[mpallamary]

FROM THE BLOOMBERG ARTICLE:

"To demonstrate the absurdity of the board’s claim, the court pointed out that the use of GPS to locate and map the cooperative’s assets was no more a land survey than the use of a GPS device by a taxi driver to find them . . . The tools are here and they’re going to be used. I do have sympathy for engineers and surveyors who will lose income and perhaps careers, just as I have sympathy for taxi drivers, travel agents and factory workers. But the tech wave isn’t really stoppable."

[mpallamary]

http://drivewithubernow.com/signup/?gcl ... gIHAfD_BwE

[mpallamary]

Start a career as a Uber Driver! You get to use your GPS as much as you want!

[David Kendall]

With all due respect, it makes no difference whatsoever how any of us feel about what is being done. That is absolutely meaningless and entirely irrelevant. In the public eye, our opinion means the least.

What is important and the ONLY THING THAT MATTERS, is how the public sees us. We are talking about a Bloomberg article. Our profession has been radically attacked and in the eyes of the consumer, our services are essentially worthless. For anyone who doesn't see this as important it naive and dare I say, foolish. So many surveyors thump their chest and say they will never take boundary work away from us. Guess what? They just did.

Boundary is the last vestige of pure surveying and we are being replaced by Uber drivers who will provide survey maps to their customers.

There is no profession unless everyone stands up and protests.

What are you doing to protect the profession?

What is CLSA doing to protect the profession besides passing plaques around?

Please suggest a solution. While I value your experience and judgment of this problem, all I hear is sounding of an alarm.

I will listen and seriously consider any proposal. Hixson wrote a great letter. My interpretation of what Pat Tami said at our chapter meeting is that the best thing we can do to combat this problem is to always behave in a professional manner and to be of service to our respective communities so that Land Surveying is respected and credible as a profession.

What does Pallamary propose that we do to save the dying Land Surveyor?

[mpallamary]

CLSA needs to refocus its efforts in a massive public relations campaign. Sadly, far too many surveyors do not act professionally. Some of us attend seminars and wear shirts and ties. Some show up in T-Shirts.

We need to reach out to our legislators and we need to organize educational trips to Sacramento and Washington DC. We need to send out press releases to local papers. Our licensing board needs to be focusing at least 25% of its time on protecting the profession and not prosecuting practitioners for making typographical errors in deed descriptions.

We need to write letters to the editor. We need to educate the profession and then the public. We need to be heard.

California should be taking the lead. We should join NSPS and get involved at the national level.

We need to write articles for magazines and newspapers. There are a thousand things we should do.

Lee's letter is great. There needs to be a thousand more from across the country. Why cannot CLSA organize a letter writing campaign? What can't we be proactive instead of reactive?

We are being equated with Uber drivers for God's sake!

I ask again, other than you, Lee and me, does anyone care?

Does anyone care?

[mpallamary]

"I am impelled, not to squeak like a grateful and apologetic mouse, but to roar like a lion out of pride in my profession."


- John Steinbeck

[mpallamary]

"The best way to predict the future is to create it."

—Abraham Lincoln

[DWoolley]

The Orange County ("OC") Chapter of CLSA (or individual Directors from OC), the practice-based chapter, has written 12 legislative proposals to protect the public and in turn, happen to protect the practice. The core purpose of the proposed legislation is to differentiate the licensed land surveyors from the folks that use the same equipment as the land surveyors i.e. GPS, total stations and UAVs.

Interestingly, CLSA members will find that the obstacles are other CLSA members. For example, one of the OC proposals is to require land surveyors to have their company name, contact information and the licensee's number displayed on the vehicle with a prescribed font size (the language was copied from the contractor's code). This is professional and puts pressure on unlicensed practice. In a meeting with licensed surveyors I literally heard a surveyor argue in opposition "if we do that we will have people calling our office!". There has been two legislative attempts to limit access to private property without permission in recent years. This limiting legislation stems from folks in the Central Valley trying to thwart the High Speed Rail. Fortunately, the sitting Governor - termed out in November - would not have allowed this legislation. The next Governor may not have the same position. All land surveying projects would be severely impacted if we had to obtain permission to access every property. And yet, mark my words, there will be licensed surveyors argue against the proposal.

The days of land surveyors sneaking around, setting untagged "monuments", performing boundary surveys using only two monuments, not signing and sealing all documents, and simply being shady have to end. If not, our traditional tools will continue be used and misused until the market is further saturated with unlicensed tradesman - resulting in the death of the trade aspects of the profession. Many of the large contractors self-perform their own "land surveying" work - especially the as-built plans, staking and oftentimes, the certifications. In my experience, only a few land surveyors are willing to say anything about it to the project owners.

For the time being, it appears as though the practice reformation will be driven by the Orange County Chapter. In January 2018, the practice-based chapter invited everyone to the dance by proposing a rewrite of the Professional Land Surveyors' Act - asking for a favorable vote on the motion and that each Director go back to their respective chapter and solicit ideas to fix their problems. The Directors from the other chapters declined the offer by a 45/55% vote. Since that time, Orange County has introduced 12 legislative proposals. As the OC Membership Chairman, if state members want their vote to count the OC would welcome your membership before the July 30th deadline - please email the OC Tech Czar at techczar@oc-surveyors.org for the forms. By way of background, OC is the current chapter of the year, newsletter of the year and some other awards. Frankly, OC has some really good folks doing the work, but I do not watch that side of the house. Fair to say OC is simply award winning.

Lastly, CLSA is now wired to be an effective professional practice advocate association. Today the association has detailed legal contracts in place for our service providers, accurate accounting systems and the financial accountability (the former CLSA CPA is being prosecuting by the California Attorney General last I heard) that allows the OC Directors to focus on their practice-based agenda.

Mr. Pallamary, I think this answers your question as to who is working on practice reformation. I am sure to have some comical stories about the the July 28th meeting during the discussion of the OC proposals - surveyors say the darnedest things.

Best,
DWoolley

[mpallamary]

Great to hear Dave! I will be writing some national editorials on this topic and doing my best to promote the profession. The OC Chapter has made great progress and continues to do so. It is my hope I can muster support from others. It would be nice if other chapters took the same initiative and developed a focused program to promote the profession. There is a lot of work to be done and I will do as much as I can at the national level, through my writing and editorial efforts.

OC is indeed leading the way. I am hopeful the rest of the association will weigh in and start to make some positive changes. If we, as an association, set some goals, and form a unified voice, we can make a difference. Needless to say, if changes do not occur at the top, they will come from within.

No one else is going to stand up for us.

[mpallamary]

For those who are unwilling to stand up and preserve the profession, I have included an application to drive for Uber. You can make a lot of money using GPS.

https://www.uber.com/a/join?exp_hvp=1&i ... =alkinm3ue

[DWoolley]

I believe the land surveying profession, particularly in California, is a good candidate for deregulation. California has, I believe, 103 licensed trades and/or professions. The licenses are viewed by the policy makers as a barrier to entry for the less fortunate or the less educated or the financially disadvantaged or whatever. Please refer to a recent edition of the Orange County newsletter for a complete article on topic.

I recommend the folks in the Sacramento area attend the next Sacramento chapter CLSA meeting. The topic of discussion is the deregulation of the professions.

August CLSA Sacramento Chapter Meeting
Thursday, August 2 at 5:00 PM
Sacramento CLSA
Logan's Roadhouse
3698 North Freeway Boulevard
Sacramento, CA 95834

DWoolley

[mpallamary]

"Suppose that you work at a small bank and you’re moderately tech-savvy. Somebody from the loan department pops in and asks you if there’s a way to use the deed to draw the property lines on a Google map of the area. You say sure, you burn a little midnight oil, and the next morning you hand over your report. It’s hard to believe that you’d have broken state law."

Bloomberg article

[DWoolley]

Most telling from the Bloomberg article:

"For a fee that averages one-tenth the price of hiring a professional surveyor, the startup will use publicly available information..."

Suppose a California professional land surveyor charged $180 an hour - one-tenth is....ah, ah, knowing math is a barrier to entry and no longer required. Suffice to say it is less than $180, I think.

DWoolley

[Jim Frame]

"Suppose that you work as a clerk at a small pharmacy and you’re moderately tech-savvy. Somebody from the dispensing department pops in and asks you if there’s a way to use the customer's symptoms to formulate a prescription. You say sure, you burn a little midnight oil, and the next morning you hand over your prescription, which contains a bit of text staying that it's not to be used for medical purposes. It’s hard to believe that you’d have broken state law."

[mpallamary]

Yes! That's about it.

[LS_8750]

Mr. Pallamary and Mr. Woolley, I support your stance and your course of action.

If we replaced the term "land surveyor" in the Bloomberg article and this discussion with say "engineer", or "doctor", would we be having the same discussion?

The psychology of the masses doesn't surprise me, but it certainly amazes me. The psychology of surveyors intrigues me. Technology is going to make geniuses, or idiots, out of all of us.

I am reminded of HAL. Who is directing this Odysey?

[DWoolley]

Interestingly, CLSA members will find that the obstacles are other CLSA members. For example, one of the OC proposals is to require land surveyors to have their company name, contact information and the licensee's number displayed on the vehicle with a prescribed font size (the language was copied from the contractor's code). This is professional and puts pressure on unlicensed practice. In a meeting with licensed surveyors I literally heard a surveyor argue in opposition "if we do that we will have people calling our office!". There has been two legislative attempts to limit access to private property without permission in recent years. This limiting legislation stems from folks in the Central Valley trying to thwart the High Speed Rail. Fortunately, the sitting Governor - termed out in November - would not have allowed this legislation. The next Governor may not have the same position. All land surveying projects would be severely impacted if we had to obtain permission to access every property. And yet, mark my words, there will be licensed surveyors argue against the proposal. DWoolley

UPDATE: As predicted, several people argued against the proposal of having the equivalent to the contractors requirements to have the name and license numbers prominently displayed on their vehicles. Yesterday the CLSA Board of Directors decided they do not want the public to know who is on their property or the fact they are licensed professionals authorized to be on their property without permission. This is a lucky break for the unlicensed practice folks - survey on fellas. The interesting juxtaposition is to consider the fervor of these same folks in pursuing their "public awareness" programs. If you are reading this and smirking...you are in good company. Carnys 1, Professionals 0. Next.

DWoolley