Yesterday was the CLSA Board of Directors meeting. These meetings are interesting and informative. CLSA is in great shape on all fronts- thank you to all of the members.
Besides having one of the coolest state stamps with the bucking horse (Steamboat) centered on the stamp, apparently Wyoming has only 124 licensed land surveyors. To the casual observer, it would appear to be a dire state of affairs compared to California's 3,850.
Not so fast, the population of Wyoming was 581,381 in 2022 - 1 licensed land surveyor per 4,700 people. The 2022 California population was 39,030,000 - 1 licensed land surveyor per 10,100 people (2X Wyoming). If California doesn't count the 1,000 out-of-state licensees the number is 1 in 13,700.
Any readers care to pontificate as to the importance our 2,800 in-state land surveyors are to the broader California society and economy? Equally, does anyone care to explain why they have allowed staff to hang around 10+ years without sitting for the LSIT or PLS?
DWoolley
Licensees - fun fact
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DWoolley
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Mike Mueller
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Re: Licensees - fun fact
Didn't the other thread on our licenses by James show that there are more Pre 82 engineers than surveyors that are able to prepare a map? IIRC it was like 4K engineers, so ratio is more like 3850+4000=7850 thus 39,030,000/7850= 4972
4972/4700 = 1.05 so we are within 5 percent of the same ratio?
I was going to ask in the meeting if you had included the engineers but the discussion moved too fast.
Don't get me wrong, I share you concern, especially with that other statistic that was shared about how 26% of the dues gathered by BPELSG is from licenses over 65. I don't know if all the various renewal fees are equally prices, but it seems likely they are in the same basic range.
Mikey Mueller, PLS 9076
Sonoma County
4972/4700 = 1.05 so we are within 5 percent of the same ratio?
I was going to ask in the meeting if you had included the engineers but the discussion moved too fast.
Don't get me wrong, I share you concern, especially with that other statistic that was shared about how 26% of the dues gathered by BPELSG is from licenses over 65. I don't know if all the various renewal fees are equally prices, but it seems likely they are in the same basic range.
Mikey Mueller, PLS 9076
Sonoma County
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DWoolley
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Re: Licensees - fun fact
Sure, let's count the pre-82 folks that were licensed 42+ years ago - most of which do not practice land surveying. The point wasn't to find a way to be on par with Wyoming. The pre-82s have to be over 65 with one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel (together with 26% of the California licensees).Mike Mueller wrote: Mon Jul 29, 2024 8:40 am Didn't the other thread on our licenses by James show that there are more Pre 82 engineers than surveyors that are able to prepare a map? IIRC it was like 4K engineers, so ratio is more like 3850+4000=7850 thus 39,030,000/7850= 4972
...
Mikey Mueller, PLS 9076
Sonoma County
On a long enough timeline land surveyors will go extinct on their own.
Back in '68 the engineers offered the land surveyors to become civil engineers with the expectation they'd practice within their area of expertise i.e. land surveying. The intent was to eliminate the land surveyors' license through attrition. In another context, would Wyoming "miss" 124 jobs? If not, California would miss these jobs even less - especially considering California laid off almost 500,000 people in the first quarter of 2024.
The millennials might want to rethink the '68 proposition. Land surveyors may not be cut out for leadership roles. The engineers will gladly tell land surveyors how to do their jobs, just like the good ol' days. Engineers are accustomed to written standards and honest law abiding professional practices (based on BPELSG's statistics).
DWoolley
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E_Page
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Re: Licensees - fun fact
If no one in WY retires, there should be 125 in a few months, although that last guy will be out of state.
As to unlicensed staff, you also need to consider what level of responsibility they are at and whether they do it well. While it has become increasingly rare over the years, many years back I worked with a guy who was a "professional" chainman. He had no ambition to go further because he didn't want the responsibility of being a chief. He was an excellent chainman and would have made a better chief than most I have known before or since. Just the opposite of most now who think that once they learn which buttons to push to create coordinates from measurements they don't understand, and have spent a summer or two on a crew that they are entitled to a promotion to chief.
One of the worst things to happen to the land surveying profession was that the engineering profession at some point in the late 1800s or about the turn of the century to 1900, decided that surveying was a minor subset of engineering. The engineering mindset of surveying has led several generations now astray. Included in that mindset is that surveying is only measurement and math, that since the math required for plane surveying is relatively easy, that no more training beyond high school trig is needed to do any kind of surveying, that a deed is a plan to which conditions on the ground must be made to reflect, that numbers are exact and my measurements are better than any previous that differ, and so on.
When I see surveyors fall short (other than contract issues), it's usually because they ignored or were unable to recognize evidence, gave no weight to existing evidence if it did not fit deed dimensions or the BLM Ch 3 math for a section breakdown (for a section which has not been previously divided), or blind reliance that a measurement resulting in a set of coordinates stored in their DC to 4 decimal places is high quality even though they didn't follow the basics of measurement science to identify and quantify errors in their own work. Most of these things can be traced back to the engineering view of surveying.
Several years ago, I reviewed a case for a BPELSG enforcement matter where the licensee was a pre-82 PE. Much of his practice was performing surveys. Being a Pre-82, he never had to take the LSIT or the LS exam and never had to prove that he knew anything about surveying. His maps looked great, far better than those of other surveyors and pre-82s performing surveys. His math was without flaw. But he discounted very pertinent field and documentary evidence in favor of Ch 3 math. He dismissed information local landowners tried to give him because "it would only confuse the issue." Bottom line is he thought he was performing surveying to a relatively high standard but screwed up pretty badly because of his view of what surveying is supposed to be and arrogance. He lost his license to survey (but retained the right to provide engineering services).
The difference between the numbers of complaints and violations among engineers and surveyors is often brought up in these discussions. First, for engineering, standards are much more easy to identify, so lets bring it down to PEs that also practice surveying.
[As an aside: It has been my observation over 40+ years of surveying that among those who practice both engineering and surveying, most are unable to do both well. Typically, a dual licensee or an engineer allowed to survey under the PE license by virtue of state law is usually a competent engineer but not a competent surveyor. There are exceptions, including some who frequent this forum. The situation has gotten somewhat better since engineers have been required to pass the LS exam, even though the LS exam has been progressively dumbed down over the years to the point that its difficulty, last I was privy to the questions, grading and scoring, to being close to that of the LSIT.]
I don't know if BPELSG keeps track of enforcement numbers to that level of detail. It would be interesting to see.
But again, it comes down to a lack of clear and concise standards. [insert old man yells at clouds image here]
Speaking to Connie's repeated call for classifications, if she means different classifications for boundary surveys, IMO there is no point. Regardless of whether in a city or in the mountains, the basic standards are the same and a set of standards can easily be written to cover or acknowledge what types of physical, map and documentary evidence one should expect to encounter and to look for. If she's talking about different types of surveys, i.e. boundary vs. setback verification vs. topo vs. exhibit drawing, etc., then we're not talking classifications so much as scope of services. Connie, please clarify.
Some think that surveying will die by the numbers of licensees. I believe that it will die by defining the minimal level of competence down to a level that anyone who has passed high school trig and studied surveying diligently for 8 weeks can pass. (I have it on good authority that several years ago, a 2nd grade teacher with no survey experience was unofficially allowed to take it and if officially graded, would have passed). It will die by continuing to allow the level of negligence and incompetence that so often gets discussed here to continue. It will die when the level of knowledge and level of care exhibited by licensees becomes indistinguishable from those who are neither licensed nor working under the direction of a licensee. For much of the land survey "industry", we're not far from that point.
Although land surveying is legally a profession in CA, it decidedly lacks many of the core traits of a profession. Among those requirements are:
With the exam and associated cut score having been designed more for "acceptable" passing rate numbers than for gauging a meaningful level of minimum competence for a little over two decades now, advanced knowledge is minimal and questionable.
Except for a few individuals in a very few pockets of the state, most of the licensees are at best ambivalent and many outright hostile to the idea of having active PPCs that seek to educate those falling short, and refer to the Board those who repeatedly fall short or don't seem to care if they fall short of competent and diligent practice.
That attitude across the body of licensees goes for practice standards as well.
With the shortcomings in the other areas, the level of trust by the public will erode to the point that surveying will die as a profession from the political pressure to allow others to provide the same level of service most surveyors provide, and no one will be providing the level of service and expertise that surveyors should provide.
As to unlicensed staff, you also need to consider what level of responsibility they are at and whether they do it well. While it has become increasingly rare over the years, many years back I worked with a guy who was a "professional" chainman. He had no ambition to go further because he didn't want the responsibility of being a chief. He was an excellent chainman and would have made a better chief than most I have known before or since. Just the opposite of most now who think that once they learn which buttons to push to create coordinates from measurements they don't understand, and have spent a summer or two on a crew that they are entitled to a promotion to chief.
One of the worst things to happen to the land surveying profession was that the engineering profession at some point in the late 1800s or about the turn of the century to 1900, decided that surveying was a minor subset of engineering. The engineering mindset of surveying has led several generations now astray. Included in that mindset is that surveying is only measurement and math, that since the math required for plane surveying is relatively easy, that no more training beyond high school trig is needed to do any kind of surveying, that a deed is a plan to which conditions on the ground must be made to reflect, that numbers are exact and my measurements are better than any previous that differ, and so on.
When I see surveyors fall short (other than contract issues), it's usually because they ignored or were unable to recognize evidence, gave no weight to existing evidence if it did not fit deed dimensions or the BLM Ch 3 math for a section breakdown (for a section which has not been previously divided), or blind reliance that a measurement resulting in a set of coordinates stored in their DC to 4 decimal places is high quality even though they didn't follow the basics of measurement science to identify and quantify errors in their own work. Most of these things can be traced back to the engineering view of surveying.
Several years ago, I reviewed a case for a BPELSG enforcement matter where the licensee was a pre-82 PE. Much of his practice was performing surveys. Being a Pre-82, he never had to take the LSIT or the LS exam and never had to prove that he knew anything about surveying. His maps looked great, far better than those of other surveyors and pre-82s performing surveys. His math was without flaw. But he discounted very pertinent field and documentary evidence in favor of Ch 3 math. He dismissed information local landowners tried to give him because "it would only confuse the issue." Bottom line is he thought he was performing surveying to a relatively high standard but screwed up pretty badly because of his view of what surveying is supposed to be and arrogance. He lost his license to survey (but retained the right to provide engineering services).
The difference between the numbers of complaints and violations among engineers and surveyors is often brought up in these discussions. First, for engineering, standards are much more easy to identify, so lets bring it down to PEs that also practice surveying.
[As an aside: It has been my observation over 40+ years of surveying that among those who practice both engineering and surveying, most are unable to do both well. Typically, a dual licensee or an engineer allowed to survey under the PE license by virtue of state law is usually a competent engineer but not a competent surveyor. There are exceptions, including some who frequent this forum. The situation has gotten somewhat better since engineers have been required to pass the LS exam, even though the LS exam has been progressively dumbed down over the years to the point that its difficulty, last I was privy to the questions, grading and scoring, to being close to that of the LSIT.]
I don't know if BPELSG keeps track of enforcement numbers to that level of detail. It would be interesting to see.
But again, it comes down to a lack of clear and concise standards. [insert old man yells at clouds image here]
Speaking to Connie's repeated call for classifications, if she means different classifications for boundary surveys, IMO there is no point. Regardless of whether in a city or in the mountains, the basic standards are the same and a set of standards can easily be written to cover or acknowledge what types of physical, map and documentary evidence one should expect to encounter and to look for. If she's talking about different types of surveys, i.e. boundary vs. setback verification vs. topo vs. exhibit drawing, etc., then we're not talking classifications so much as scope of services. Connie, please clarify.
Some think that surveying will die by the numbers of licensees. I believe that it will die by defining the minimal level of competence down to a level that anyone who has passed high school trig and studied surveying diligently for 8 weeks can pass. (I have it on good authority that several years ago, a 2nd grade teacher with no survey experience was unofficially allowed to take it and if officially graded, would have passed). It will die by continuing to allow the level of negligence and incompetence that so often gets discussed here to continue. It will die when the level of knowledge and level of care exhibited by licensees becomes indistinguishable from those who are neither licensed nor working under the direction of a licensee. For much of the land survey "industry", we're not far from that point.
Although land surveying is legally a profession in CA, it decidedly lacks many of the core traits of a profession. Among those requirements are:
- Education
Advanced knowledge
Be self-policing
Having a recognizable set of standards for professional conduct and professional practice
Enjoy a level of trust by the public based on the other traits and the importance of the service to society
With the exam and associated cut score having been designed more for "acceptable" passing rate numbers than for gauging a meaningful level of minimum competence for a little over two decades now, advanced knowledge is minimal and questionable.
Except for a few individuals in a very few pockets of the state, most of the licensees are at best ambivalent and many outright hostile to the idea of having active PPCs that seek to educate those falling short, and refer to the Board those who repeatedly fall short or don't seem to care if they fall short of competent and diligent practice.
That attitude across the body of licensees goes for practice standards as well.
With the shortcomings in the other areas, the level of trust by the public will erode to the point that surveying will die as a profession from the political pressure to allow others to provide the same level of service most surveyors provide, and no one will be providing the level of service and expertise that surveyors should provide.
Evan Page, PLS
A Visiting Forum Essayist
A Visiting Forum Essayist
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subman
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Re: Licensees - fun fact
Wouldn’t a better comparison be the number of surveyors v Tax parcels? What use do apartment dwellers (a large part of the population) have for a surveyor?
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LS_8750
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Re: Licensees - fun fact
+1 Mr. Subman...
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bryanmundia
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Re: Licensees - fun fact
According to my local AI interface there are approximately 15,500,000 tax parcels in California.
With 3,850 Licensed Surveyors that would be approximately 1 surveyor per 4,000 tax parcels and approximately 1 surveyor per 5,400 tax parcels if we take away the out of state licensees.
If you lump in the engineers it would be approximately 1 surveyor per 3,100 tax parcels in California.
With that being said, we have to compare apples to apples so I was able to find that Wyoming has about 225,000 tax parcels when asking the same local AI interface.
Working the math out it is then approximately 1 surveyor per 1,800 tax parcels in Wyoming.
Kind of curious how it comes out to be about 2X Wyoming if we only consider licensed surveyors, just like what was stated in the original post.
Conspiracy or coincidence, I'll let you be the judge of that based on the facts.
With 3,850 Licensed Surveyors that would be approximately 1 surveyor per 4,000 tax parcels and approximately 1 surveyor per 5,400 tax parcels if we take away the out of state licensees.
If you lump in the engineers it would be approximately 1 surveyor per 3,100 tax parcels in California.
With that being said, we have to compare apples to apples so I was able to find that Wyoming has about 225,000 tax parcels when asking the same local AI interface.
Working the math out it is then approximately 1 surveyor per 1,800 tax parcels in Wyoming.
Kind of curious how it comes out to be about 2X Wyoming if we only consider licensed surveyors, just like what was stated in the original post.
Conspiracy or coincidence, I'll let you be the judge of that based on the facts.
Bryan Mundia
PLS 9591, Orange County, California
PLS 9591, Orange County, California
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hellsangle
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Re: Licensees - fun fact
Nice job, Bryan!
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Mike Mueller
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Re: Licensees - fun fact
Thanks for getting the parcel number data.
Quick double check: Surveyors plus Pre82 engineers is 7850 I thought? So 15,500,000/7850 =1974 parcels per person licensed to survey it. Same as Wyoming, ish. Kinda cool that population and tax parcels are that well correlated for CA and WY.
Which just makes the looming demographic cliff even scarier, since those pre82s are prolly going to be leaving the surveying community at a rate close to what the actuarial tables would suggest, or roughly 6% a year for folks over 65. https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/73/wr/mm7326a3.htm
6% of 4000 is around 240, then 225 then 212 etc.
According to Ric's bulletin from Fall of 2023, https://www.bpelsg.ca.gov/pubs/bulletin.latest.pdf The total active licensed surveyors went down 10 from 2012 to 2023. There are no indications in the pipeline that we are going to start adding an extra 200 new licenses on top of our own replacement rate.
Guess we need to get better at doing more faster! :)
Mikey Mueller, PLS 9076
Sonoma County
Quick double check: Surveyors plus Pre82 engineers is 7850 I thought? So 15,500,000/7850 =1974 parcels per person licensed to survey it. Same as Wyoming, ish. Kinda cool that population and tax parcels are that well correlated for CA and WY.
Which just makes the looming demographic cliff even scarier, since those pre82s are prolly going to be leaving the surveying community at a rate close to what the actuarial tables would suggest, or roughly 6% a year for folks over 65. https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/73/wr/mm7326a3.htm
6% of 4000 is around 240, then 225 then 212 etc.
According to Ric's bulletin from Fall of 2023, https://www.bpelsg.ca.gov/pubs/bulletin.latest.pdf The total active licensed surveyors went down 10 from 2012 to 2023. There are no indications in the pipeline that we are going to start adding an extra 200 new licenses on top of our own replacement rate.
Guess we need to get better at doing more faster! :)
Mikey Mueller, PLS 9076
Sonoma County
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hellsangle
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Re: Licensees - fun fact
Or as Mr. Wooley suggests: get our LSITs licensed . . .(or the CEs may be allowed to do our work if there is not enough of us licensed!)Guess we need to get better at doing more faster!
Crazy Phil's two cents
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subman
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Re: Licensees - fun fact
Note, condo units get an APN and I presume a much larger percentage of the total in CA compared to WY.
Condo units once built don’t generate new survey work. Only the common area ground APN.
Condo units once built don’t generate new survey work. Only the common area ground APN.