Last year we did a job in an old somewhat messed up subdivision and the clearing contractor clipped this guys corner leaving it slightly bent and the plastic cap missing. The property owner complains and I go out and verify the location is the same as when we recovered it prior to any work taking place. Straighten the corner and rehab it, but I??m not about to put my cap on it. This is completely unacceptable to the guy who demands a new pin and cap or otherwise the pin is in his words ??metal junk??. Around and around I went with him over a 50 cent plastic cap. I??ll look up the LS on the cap in the notes and see if it??s possible to get another from them after verifying the position is valid with them, but I decided to end the call before telling him to pound sand. To him that cheesy cap was the only thing in his mind that made it his corner and not a ??piece of metal junk??. No reasoning with some people.
Why not put your cap on it and file a Monument Record?
@frozennorth Fair question. May come to that. Mostly I don??t want assume liability for a corner I did not set. Is that unreasonable?
Forgot to mention that fellow involved mentioned a boundary dispute he is in with a neighbor that I??d be purchasing a front row seat to.
I think the Monument Record protects you from that liability, since you will show that you only restored it to make it "readily identifiable and reasonably durable" in line with AS 34.65.040.
If I'm the property owner, I would want to be made whole, too.?ÿ I think it's the statutory duty of the clearing contractor to make him whole, and their means to do that is to pay you to "reference and replace" destroyed mons and "reference and rehab" damaged ones.
Without a cap, it seems that this guy's monument got downgraded to a goat stake.
Forgot to mention that fellow involved mentioned a boundary dispute he is in with a neighbor that I??d be purchasing a front row seat to.
Yuck, not fun.
@frozennorth You know what they say about no good deed going unpunished.
If the guy wasn??t such a jerk I??d be far more inclined to go the monument record route and perpetuate the corner with my cap. My instincts say don??t do it.
If you've located it and accepted it, then you kind of own it already.?ÿ I'd have no issue re-habbing it, and if he insisted on having an ID cap, and was paying for it, I'd probably yank it and set something new in its place, and write that on the plan.
I do believe the contractor needs to pay to have it reestablished.?ÿ
@mightymoe Agreed, but likely not worth the hassle getting them to do anything as they were operating under the client's charge, so I sort of own it. I have to suck it up, replace it and record a monument record.?ÿ
I'll probably turn the table on him and thank him for taking his property corners so seriously and send the clearing contractor a thank you card for the job security.?ÿ
I guess my real issue was putting my cap on another surveyor's pin. I'll yank it and set a new one and move on.?ÿ
Thanks for being my sounding board.
?ÿ
It is one thing to verify the pin is at the same coordinate that you located it previously. But no way in heck should you put your cap on it without verifying it is indeed where you would mark the boundary corner. Just saying a pin has not moved in no way obligates you to assume the liability for it marking a property corner. Now if someone wants to hire you to survey the property and set a capped corner so be it.
Last year we did a job in an old somewhat messed up subdivision and the clearing contractor clipped this guys corner leaving it slightly bent and the plastic cap missing. The property owner complains and I go out and verify the location is the same as when we recovered it prior to any work taking place. Straighten the corner and rehab it, but I??m not about to put my cap on it. This is completely unacceptable to the guy who demands a new pin and cap or otherwise the pin is in his words ??metal junk??. Around and around I went with him over a 50 cent plastic cap. I??ll look up the LS on the cap in the notes and see if it??s possible to get another from them after verifying the position is valid with them, but I decided to end the call before telling him to pound sand. To him that cheesy cap was the only thing in his mind that made it his corner and not a ??piece of metal junk??. No reasoning with some people.
What state are you in??ÿ Very interesting replies.?ÿ In Louisiana we are not required to stamp our monuments.?ÿ Interested in learning what other states require you to do after setting a pin.
Interested in learning what other states require you to do after setting a pin.
For Washington State:
RCW?ÿ58.09.120
Monuments??Requirements.
?ÿI have a hard time wrapping my head around the concept of licensees not being required to mark their monuments. How would the next surveyor know who set it or who to call if they discover a discrepancy during a retracement??ÿ
Yeah, it makes about as much sense as surveying in a non-recording state.?ÿ Just baffling to me...
I have a hard time wrapping my head around the concept of licensees not being required to mark their monuments
While going around with the property owner on the phone yesterday, he was going on about how much money he had to spend to have the corners set, so I asked him, if he'd spent that much money, surely he would remember who did the work. Crickets. He comes back with he'll have to look it up later. So today I get a couple photos from him of a Record of Survey done in 2004 by a company out of business. The caps were illegible when we tied them so I wanted to know who set them and if there was a record or if the surveyor was still around before I went and pulled his corner up and replaced it with one my own. He bought the place in 2014. The big lying jerk. Just glad he's not my neighbor.
