I was only going for the lowest hanging fruit.
And would argue the Louisiana purchase was the original'state' you're referring to
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In my former life as a county surveyor here in Oregon (a recording state), the survey or monument records would have to have been reviewed in accordance to statutes by the county surveyor's office before being filed. From what you say they would have miserably failed the review and the surveyor would be required to straighten up, fly right and do the work correctly. If they didn't, the un-filed survey would have been forwarded to the state board for review and, with work that is so egregious, this guy would have been pilloried, fined and had his license either suspended or revoked.?ÿ The most important part of this tale is that the public would have been protected from such a piece of $hit survey ever being filed in the public record.
Granted, some crap surveys do get filed, as Norman Oklahoma alluded to, but those usually toe the fine line of subjective interpretations of the elements controlling the boundary. Ignoring the recorded location of monumented PLSS corners in favor of plunking PK nails down in road intersections is incompetence and/or gross negligence, which is something the state board can rule on.
@holy-cow this is the perfect example of why public bidding laws make no sense.?ÿ Both my former employer and I bid a large electronic tax map project for a town in NJ.?ÿ We were (and are) on really good terms and were the only two bidders in the room when roughly 15 bid packages were opened.?ÿ After going through all of the bids, the Town Clerk told us what the low number was but refused to tell us who else bid and what their numbers were.
My former employer and I walked out together and had a conversation in the parking lot.?ÿ The low bid was roughly 1/3 of mine and my former employer was only about $6K higher than me.?ÿ This was a very large three year project and there's no way it could be done properly for the price it was awarded for.?ÿ The deed research alone was a full time job.
Holy Cow, please enlighten this old Yankee, what is a cotton spindle?
A bunch of them are used in a cotton picker machine and they wear out so that used ones are sold for other purposes.?ÿ The dimple in the gear end makes them attractive for surveyors.
It has always been my understanding that Congress was the ONLY government body that could authorize the re-survey of an entire township.?ÿ I'm not sure about OK, but in AR, if a surveyor resets a single section corner, it must meet certain criteria, is reviewed by the State Surveyor, and is recorded for posterity.?ÿ It doesn't appear that this FBN team had the proper authorization to re-survey a single township, not complied with the recording requirements of the State of Oklahoma (if any).?ÿ?ÿ
I will start?ÿ with this, I have never worked for a firm such as this. I have never will.
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If they set a sufficient monument and file a proper corner record, most boards of registrations have no right to stop them. They have complied with the laws and administrative rules. The boards have no power to stop them. They leave a substantial mess in their wake. Any subsequent surveyor or clients likely do not have the financial resources to take them to court. If one does, the survey company will likely just pay them off and continue on. Nothing ever really happens to the offending party.?ÿ
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I have had the pleasure of following one company across 3 states. The same LS signing off on the surveys. Absolute crap work! The individual is now a vice president of a large company and has an impressive list of 20 some pieces of paper on the wall. Every issue myself or the LS I was working under contacted him when errors, mistakes, multiple monuments, or gross negligence the standard response was I stand behind my work. That happened for about the first year, then the responses stopped.?ÿ
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I still make the effort to contact him via email when I file a survey or corner record which does not agree with his interpretation. About 6 months ago, I noticed an email from his adress in my inbox. I thought wow, I actually received a response. The email account was hacked and it was sending out spam.
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Part of the reason I'm opposed to publishing coordinates on any survey is companies such as these. The will obtain all the existing corner records inside of a township and go to town. The existing monuments will entered in and all the corners close will be calculates.?ÿ A couple of swings of the metal detector at the recorded corner confirms its location. If a corner is missing and required to be set, take a couple swings at the calculated position. No ring, beat a corner in and call it good.?ÿ
A corner record is then prepared, stating the BLM manual was used to set the corner, filed in the appropriate office, and they have complied with most existing laws and administrative rules. One to the next project.
