Posted on 02/03/2011 1:37:16 PM PST by antiRepublicrat
RALEIGH -- David N. Cox says he was merely exercising his right to petition the government, but a state Department of Transportation official has raised allegations that Cox committed a misdemeanor: practicing engineering without a license.
Cox and his North Raleigh neighbors are lobbying city and state officials to add traffic signals at two intersections as part of a planned widening of Falls of Neuse Road.
After an engineering consultant hired by the city said that the signals were not needed, Cox and the North Raleigh Coalition of Homeowners' Associations responded with a sophisticated analysis of their own.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsobserver.com ...
Absolutely.
In our case, the state hired someone to perform a study, and we have evidence that they lied on their traffic counts. We did traffic counts that weren’t even within 25 percent of the state counts.
The engineer signed off on our plan, and offered suggestions and improvments. He also demonstrated where the state plan did not stand up to scrutiny, so you can understand why the government did not like the opposing study.
Does the state also certify “traffic counters”? How ridiculous does it get? (They might want a time stamped video for evidence, but gee whiz.)
I was once invited to give a technical talk to a meeting of the Ohio Society of Professional Engineers. The speaker following my talk was from the Ohio Department of Transportation. I got no questions after my talk. The ODOT guy was bombarded with accusations that he was not using enough Registered Professional Engineers in his department. His response, repeated several times, was that he was using PEs in every position where it was required by law. That was a real eye-opener to me about professional engineers.
(Full disclosure: although I passed the Engineer in Training exam while in college, I never went on to take the exam for Registration, as I never held a job that required it.)
This is a really good question.
An engineer is licensed by the state because (in part) when he stamps and signs a document, it becomes a legal document that can be included in a legal contract.
States have this “right” because states have their own legal systems. While the federal government has specific, enumerated powers, states have whatever power their constitutions give them.
Note that there are no federally licensed engineers.
Mabye. Then again, maybe state law requires it to submit work to the DOT. I doubt it but I’m not a civil engineer licensed in the state of North Carolina.
From the article, “But Lacy says he filed the complaint because the report “appears to be engineering-level work” by someone who is not licensed as a professional engineer.”
I’ve never heard that doing what “appears to be engineering-level work” to be a requirement to have a license. If it were then thousands of contractors would be in jail.
This is pure bullshit.
Unless you did the work for compensation that is tangible, no license is required.
>> “The ONLY reason for the state to “license” any professional is so they can take some of their money.” <<
.
That’s a fact!
Be glad that you are not in Californicate. They have been raising our fees by forcing us to renew twice as often.
Frankly, traffic analysis work just doesn’t require any professional level skills or knowledge.
All it requires is a bit of organization of your thought processes.
The insurance company has a lot more substantial stake in not insuring bad engineers and architects than the state, which incurs no liability with their "license."
The state just check credentials from other entities and collects their exorbitant fee.
Insurance companies check a lot more than that.
WTF???!!!!
He's being investigated because he's too smart for his own good!
“No engineer or architect can work without insurance.”
Really? Hmmmm. I’ve never seen that requirement. Can you show me a law that says that?
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