By:  Wentworth                                                    S.B. No. 1454


A BILL TO BE ENTITLED

AN ACT

relating to the definition of professional surveying.                         
	BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:                        
	SECTION 1.  Subdivision (6), Section 1071.002, Occupations 
Code, is amended to read as follows:
		(6)  "Professional surveying" means the practice of 
land, boundary, or property surveying or other similar professional 
practices.  The term includes:
			(A)  performing any service or work the adequate 
performance of which involves applying special knowledge of the 
principles of geodesy, mathematics, related applied and physical 
sciences, and relevant laws to the measurement or location of 
sites, points, lines, angles, elevations, natural features, and 
existing man-made works in the air, on the earth's surface, within 
underground workings, and on the beds of bodies of water to 
determine areas and volumes for:
				(i)  locating real property boundaries;                                     
				(ii)  platting and laying out land and 
subdivisions of land; or           
				(iii)  preparing and perpetuating maps, 
record plats, field note records, easements, and real property
descriptions that represent those surveys; and
			(B)  consulting, investigating, evaluating, 
analyzing, planning, providing an expert surveying opinion or 
testimony, acquiring survey data, preparing technical reports, and 
mapping to the extent those acts are performed in connection with 
acts described by this subdivision [Paragraph (A)].
	SECTION 2.  This Act takes effect immediately if it receives 
a vote of two-thirds of all the members elected to each house, as 
provided by Section 39, Article III, Texas Constitution.  If this 
Act does not receive the vote necessary for immediate effect, this 
Act takes effect September 1, 2005.