Land Surveyor as Equity Judge: With Bonus Ethics for Land Surveyors Presentation

Land Surveyor as Equity Judge
With Bonus Ethics for Land Surveyors Presentation

Update 6/5/2019: Online Registration has closed, but we are still excepting registrations. Please fill out the registration form and send it to edevane@engineers.org

Friday, June 7, 2019
Hilton Garden Inn Worcester
35 Major Taylor Blvd, Worcester, MA 01608
8:00 - 8:30 AM Registration; 8:30 AM - 4:30 PM Seminar

Presented by Jeffery N. Lucas from ESP Associates AL, the objective of this seminar is to enhance professional competency and improve practitioner’s knowledge of the law as it relates to the practice of land surveying. Featured topics include:

Land Surveyor as Equity Judge 
Over 125 years ago, Justice Cooley wrote and spoke about the quasi‐judicial function of the land surveyor when performing the surveyor’s role as a retracing surveyor. Why did he make this comparison in this context? Does the land surveyor truly have a quasi‐judicial function, and if so, how does that compare and contrast with the function of the law judge sitting on the bench or the jury sitting in the jury box? While Cooley might be the most prominent voice to talk about the surveyor’s quasi‐judicial functions, he certainly wasn’t the only one to do so. Z.A. Enos (Ill. c.1890), F. Hodgman (Mich. c.1890), A.C. Mulford (N.Y. c.1900), and Frank Emerson Clark (Minn. c.1920), are a few of the earlier voices on this same subject. In more recent years notable surveyors such as Ira Tillotson (c.1974), Henry Sipe (c.1974), Dean & McEntyre (c.1974), and Williams & Onsrud (c.1986), discussed the surveyor’s role as judge and jury when it comes to final boundary decisions. In this seminar we will take these discussions deeper to understand what they all were talking about and to shed light on the surveyor’s role as an equity judge.

Ethics for Land Surveyors and Engineers  
Utilizing the National Society of Professional Surveyor’s (NSPS’s) “Creed and Canons” and state‐specific codes of professional conduct as a basis for discussion, this seminar will study ethical consideration in everyday practice. Real cases involving real surveyors and engineers will be discussed and explored for the ethical issues that they contain. Some hypothetical situations are also discussed. This seminar usually generates plenty of discussion over the case scenarios and the actions of the surveyors and engineers involved.

Speaker: Jeffery N. Lucas, Survey Manager, Alabama Operations, ESP Associates AL, Inc.

Jeffery N. Lucas is the Survey Manager, Alabama Operations, for ESP Associates AL,  Inc, a multi-disciplined engineering and surveying firm headquartered in Fort Mill, South Carolina (Charlotte area). Lucas has been in the surveying business since 1976. He is a licensed land surveyor registered in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi and Tennessee. Lucas is a licensed attorney and was admitted to the Alabama State Bar in 2003. Lucas specializes in land boundary issues as an attorney, land surveyor, consultant, mediator and expert witness. He has been a seminar leader on surveying topics that include boundary law, law of easements, water boundaries, surveying evidence and procedures, expert witness testimony, business law, contract law, torts and liability. He has over 30 titles that he has developed in his seminar library. Lucas is the author of  “Alabama Boundary Law,” “The Pincushion Effect, The Multiple Monument Dilemma in American Land Surveying” and “Illinois Boundary Law” which was featured in February, 2013, at the Illinois Professional Land Surveyors Association (IPLSA) conference in Springfield, Illinois. He has also authored over 100 articles on surveying and boundary issues and writes a regular column for P.O.B. Magazine since 2004.

Registration Information
Registration fees are $200/person for MALSCE members and $250/person for non-members. See form for details. Registration fee includes a continental breakfast, two snack breaks, lunch and all seminar handouts. Registration is processed on a first-come, first-served basis. 

Registration deadline: Friday, May 31, 2019. No refunds will be given after this date. No-shows will be billed. Seminar registrations will be accepted via fax, mail or online. Fax your registration to 617/227-6783. Mail your registration form and check (payable to “MALSCE”) to: MALSCE, The Engineering Center, One Walnut Street, Boston, MA 02108-3616. Use Visa, MasterCard or American Express to register online above. To register online for this seminar at the MALSCE member rate, login using your MALSCE assigned username and password. If you do not know your member login information or if you need help registering call 617/227-5551.