I usually look forward to each edition of POB, so much so that I normally read many of the articles online before the hard copy comes in the snail mail. This month was an exception, I have been extremely busy dealing with problems that I should not have to deal with. Some on this board are aware of what I dealing with, and right now the details are not important. I have just finished reading the articles by Jeff Lucas and Milton Denny. The problem is I can't decide what to do, stand up and cheer, or sit down and cry.
Both authors raise essentially the same points concerning the "trend" of our once honored profession rapidly being relegated to the trash bin of history - mainly from our own doing, or actually undoing. Bravo to both for having the courage to bring this topic to the front.
They, however, I believe have missed a major issue that has contributed and will continue to contribute to the decline of my loved profession. That is the boards of registration in many, if not most of the states. How many states have boards and the staffs of the Boards of registration that are not comprised soley, if not mostly of actual Land Surveyors? Probably the minority.
How can a profession such as ours, or any other esteemed profession for that matter, remain relevant, let alone thrive, grow, and achieve its main purpose of protecting the public if the BOARD OF REGISTRATION, you know the ones that are supposed to create policies, standards, promulgate rules and regulations, and enforce such standards, if the Boards themselves are made up of members that have little or no clue as to what a licensed member of that profession actually does, and more importantly, is SUPPOSED to do on a daily basis?
Maybe one day, when we as surveyors finally realize that we are not the insignificant, red-headed step children of engineering and that we are capable of being more than mere expert measures, we will have earned the title "professional". Until that day (I ain't holdin' my breath) we may be getting just what we deserve - thrown unceremoniously into that trash bin.
Surveyors (people who can measure, locate boundary lines, and take responsibility for their actions) will be needed as long as stuff is built and property changes hands. If anything is found to be redundant it will be the Registration boards. Without a licence to set us apart we would have to depend on our reputation.
Subject must be too tough to consider and comment on. I've scanned the articles, but haven't read them thoroughly yet. There are comments I'd like to make in response, and partial agreement to yours, but am going to consider them very carefully before I do.
Okay, I'll bite.
They're both wrong.
Lucas: he says we're all on crack, but so are the attorneys. This indicates it is a complicated matter. One can't just hope that surveyors somehow gain the knowledge to do a boundary from thin air. If it's that tough, and no one is an expert at it, then shouldn't there be some route developed to teach it to someone? I'm thinking it will be taught to attorneys eventually before surveyors step up to the plate.
Denny: no one is ever going to professionally license the use of a computer. Selling data is a losing proposition, everyone can collect it these days. One must add value to the data for it, and them, to be worth anything. This is just a ridiculus argument that is put forth by engineering boards who are afraid an educated surveyor will perform work that engineers provide. Yeah, tell the surveyors they should have the GIS and GPS market and we'll back them. Right.
No, the problem is twofold, well maybe onefold. Surveyors have not embraced the changes in society that affect their traditional practice areas. I'm not talking about technology. Technology is ancillary to anything any profession does.
Where surveyors have failed is in the area of not keeping educated about boundary determination as many boundaries have become retracement and an exercise in evidence and law rather than measurement.
Where surveyors have failed is in the area of helping their clients understand and comply with regulatory matters affecting the use of the land. Surveyors used to be the ones to determine the soils, vegetation, wetlands, etc. and what purposes or affects they might have on use of the land. These things have been extensively studied and become more complex. Surveyors did not study them because they had no academic leadership, which in turn is because they refused any academic requirement, or the engineering profession refused it to them.
Essentially, all the value we used to provide has been taken up by others. This is because of the development boom where there were not enough surveyors to cheaply and quickly divide land. So, we became the "mathmatical stakers". Get it out there and let others take it from there.
For the profession to survive it must return to its roots. There must be formal education in land boundary law that no one else receives. There must be formal education in plant and soil identification and in erosion and stormwater so that a surveyor has some value in the land use area. And yes, the surveyor will still need to keep up with technology, but it is not a defining property of a profession.
For the profession to survive it must return to its roots. There must be formal education in land boundary law that no one else receives.
Believe you are mistaken in that statement. Our value in boundary matters today and in the past after the initial divisions of land were complete is in the application of the law, today becoming more complex with the additional need to know zoning and planning requirements in order to guide our clients through a complex mess. That requires knowledge of law, the measurement techniques became secondary. The part we are missing is that the value of our work to the general public has a direct relationship with what is taught in law school. When the masses started to move to town the needed knowledge of attorneys was changed from land title matters to corporate law, contractual law and has evolved to a point very far removed from the land laws being of much importance to the typical law school graduate, their education reflects that fact. When the law schools return to teaching land law beyond just a chapter in a book and leaving the idea that adverse possession is the only catch all, will we have advocates where it will do the most good. Until the value of what a boundary surveyor does is recognized by the legal profession, we will be at a disadvantage primarily because the legal profession, in ignorance, will never recommend our services and only become involved with any problems after litigation is started. They will not be aware of the preventive steps owners can take to protect their lands by using boundary surveyors. Until they are educated to that fact and start advising their clients to obtain boundary surveys we will slowly loose work and only become a necessary evil because of the rules of the planning department. The other things we are loosing to technology will continue to be lost. As some have told me, progress, move on and get over it.
jud
I am reading a book about George Washington.
He made his early money Surveying. Sounds crazy, what making money surveying?
He was working for Lord Fairfax who owned huge tracts of land. The book doesn't give much in the way of details but says he would go out to the wilderness and layout lots or tracts. They made the most money on the ones they could get done in a day. I assume he set stakes or marked trees then wrote the legal descriptions but that's just a guess.
So the insight I get from this is for most of the history of Surveying in the USA we have been either laying out new boundaries or participating in construction projects. Only a small portion of the work available has been retracing old surveys. I think about the mid-1950s neighborhood I live in. The engineering firm that did most of the work around here had to retrace late 19th century subdivisions (large lots) and if they did it wrong it didn't really matter. Assume there is an 1890 lot line running along the centerline of Eastern Avenue for a mile. Engineer comes in and does Subdivision A on the west side and somehow establishes this lot line's location (no one really knows how he did it because the Plats from those days don't give any details, they are just a picure). Then he comes in and does Subdivision B on the East. 50 years goes by and who is going to argue? When development is going hot and heavy retracement takes a back seat because we have to get it done so everyone can make money. As time goes by the old original locations are erased by construction.
Now we are transitioning into a new era where most of the Surveying work will be retracing and for the most part we aren't equipped to deal with that. The education is mostly engineering oriented and run by engineers. If you spend four years in hard sciences and calculus there is simply less time for a legally oriented education. A few surveyors are doing legally oriented work but they are the minority.