Upside-down tag

[Dave Lindell]

While tying out property corners that are going to be destroyed during sidewalk reconstruction I came across what I thought was a blank tag.

Since it was going to be destroyed anyway I removed it and turned it over.

Voila! An RCE had his tags set upside down. Because it was a corner lot the other two property prolongations were in also. Both set upside down.

And..you probably already guessed...no Corner Record is filed.

What would you do?

[Ric7308]

What do you think my recommendation would be?

[bruce hall]

I'd file a CR for monument perpetuation purposes, maybe write a letter to the RE license holder asking for his notes. After that, kinda hard to say. What would you do, Paul?

[bruce hall]

Your Dave. Sorry.

[pls7809]

I would try to contact the RCE, stating that I found his tags at (address & APN) and they were set upside down in the pipe. I would also mention that I will be sending my record (RS or CR??) to the county within (timeframe) and I am trying to find the reference for these monuments. Please give me a call back to discuss, or provide me the filing information of your record (RS or CR??) which I can reference these to. The county may have mis-filed or mis-indexed the record, for all anyone knows.

Then if no response, or unsatisfactory response, I would file my record and then make a complaint to the PPC or BPELSG.

[Jim Frame]

My response would depend in part upon my familiarity with the engineer's practice record. If the preponderance of his work shows tags set numbers up, I'd be inclined to wonder if someone in his employ had been moonlighting and "borrowed" some tags to set without identifying the responsible party.

[Berk Blake, PLS CA]

I go along with Bruce, but would just forward a copy of my CR to the engineer

[LS 4722]

First off I probably would not have pulled the tag out to read the number, but that's me.

I have set inverted tags quite a few times at rear corner offsets. Never on a lot line prod in a sidewalk though.

As far as a CR being filed by the upside down RE, maybe that tag was set way back when, before filing a CR was such a hot item.

I have come across quite a few monuments that do not have a record associated with them. Some of the tags I have seen like this were set after the CR requirement came into being, you can usually tell by the tag number. In any case, I don't call the person or file a complaint, I just do my work and file the record that the survey requires.

My big gripe are the architects that call out offsets from property line. Sometimes I contact Ric in these cases, really depends on how much harm is being done to my client because of a bad setback location shown on an architects site plan.

PS Do state regulations actually state that the number has to be face up or is that just an assumption that everyone makes? Another storm in a tea cup is my thought on this.

[Jim Frame]

"Any monument set by a licensed land surveyor or registered civil engineer to mark or reference a point on a property or land line shall be permanently and visibly marked or tagged with the certificate number of the surveyor"

I think the word "visibly" precludes the upside down thing.

[LS 4722]

What about those many iron pipes that are set x inches deep? Violation?

Your reference says "..visibly marked OR tagged.." it should say ".. visibly marked AND tagged.."

[Jim Frame]

What about those many iron pipes that are set x inches deep? Violation?

No violation in my opinion. "Visibly marked" refers to the monument; I don't find anything in the code that says the monument has to be exposed. Resorting to devious means to conceal the monument could be construed as a violation, though. As usual, the devil is in the details.

The tag might have been installed upside-down unintentionally. However, the only reason I can think of for intentionally inverting a tag is to hide the number, and the only reason I can think of for hiding the number is that the person setting it has to do so in order to get paid, but doesn't want anyone to be able to identify who set it because he knows that his survey doesn't comport with the standard of practice. The tag-setter could be the licensee whose number is on the tag, or someone else who did the survey without the licensee's supervision. Hard to say what happened without further investigation.

[Dave Karoly, PLS]

We uncovered four Caltrans 1" iron pipes with their plastic plug on Highway 152 near Gilroy, down 1' to 1.5' near a chain link fence. Schoenstedt WEEEEEEE, well it could be here! dig dig dig! find it! Jesus, did they really have to bury it?

Then we went and found four "C" monuments (6x6 concrete) on the old highway R/W, now that is a MONUMENT!

[LS 4722]

When a CR does not turn up for a found monument during county research, let's not be so quick as to blame the registrant for non filing.

I recall one instance when the county surveyors office called me and requested another mylar of an RS I had done. The mylar that I had submitted to them earlier, well, they lost it.

I obliged with a new mylar and the world kept turning.

If a wet signed mylar can be lost, so can a CR.

Off subject a bit.

Less than two weeks ago I get a phone call from a lady that wants one corner monument replaced. She said the neighbor had removed it. I did a search on her property and no record turned up. I called her back and told her that since there was no record on the property the cost of the survey will be X amount. She was not happy about that.

I referred her to Ric and then looked up the registrant number (she had a signed map with the LS number on it). The registrant is 94 years old and has an active license. I really doubt that this individual would give a damn if he received a letter from the board regarding the missing CR. I think she told me the survey had been done in the late 80's. County filing/indexing of records was still in an infancy stage then. Maybe the CS office just lost the record. Who knows.