Public Land Corners Audit Report

Resources should be obtained and invested to support the mandated service

March 2026
Report by the Clackamas County Office of County Internal Audit

Jodi Cochran, CPA, CIA, CGMA, CRMA
County Internal Auditor

Kathy Yeung, CPA, CIA
Senior Internal Auditor

Executive summary
Background
Observations
Recommendations
Objectives, scope and methodology
About the Office of County Internal Audit

I. Executive summary

Public land corner program resources should be obtained and invested to support data integrity and strategic plan development.

Clackamas County has approximately 7,430 public land corners. Of those, approximately 3,502 corners are within the priority boundary for restoration and monitoring. An online interactive map is available for the public to locate public land corners and view public records related to these corners. This tool increases public transparency and data accessibility.

Key observations included:

The exact number of public land corners is fluid. Changing land conditions and ownership patterns, survey needs and data collection practices impact the documented number and condition of physical monuments at any given point in time.
Three main tracking systems are used to record and manage public land corner data.
Inconsistent formatting and a duplicate corner entry were noted when testing the tracking systems.
An online map, created from the tracked data, allows the public to learn more about the location and details of the public land corners in Clackamas County.
The most efficient and effective year for corner restoration in the recent decade used a three-person survey field crew working together in the field and office.
The number of licensed surveyors is declining in Oregon as the current workforce grows closer to retirement age.
The risk of noncompliance with Oregon Revised Statues increases if allocation of staff time becomes insufficient to meet and fulfill this mandated service.
There is no documented strategic plan to define the timeline and analysis of when all corners will be re-monumented, support program sustainability and succession planning, and design a program pathway from reactive to proactive.

Recommendations

Two recommendations were made addressing potential improvements to the public land corner program. Detailed observations and recommendations are included in this report.

Invest resources to support data integrity in tracking systems.

Develop a strategic plan for the public land corner program.

Management response

The surveyor’s office has reviewed and agreed with these recommendations. Full responses have been included in this report.

Acknowledgments and gratitude

Team members of the surveyor’s office and technology services’ geographic information systems division have contributed their time and effort to provide access to the information and data cited. These contributions significantly supported the completion of this review. Collaborative efforts are vital to the county’s ability to successfully meet objectives, as well as identify, thoroughly analyze, and appropriately respond to risks. We demonstrate our core values, SPIRIT, when we collectively and proactively identify steps to streamline processes, strengthen controls, and mitigate risks.

Special thanks to Pat Gaylord, Jon McDowell, Gina Buckel, Marlin Davidson, and Cheryl Bell for their contributions and support for this engagement, and Mark McBride and Dylan Blaylock with the public and government affairs department for their assistance in the report design, formatting, and conducting post-audit administrative tasks.

Background

Public land corners are important

Public land corners are the foundation for everything related to the land system in Clackamas County, the State of Oregon and the western United States. The Public Land Survey System (PLSS) is the rectangular grid system for surveying – measuring, mapping and recording land. A public land corner is a specific geographic point marked or referenced by a physical monument, usually a brass disk, pipe or stone. These monuments serve as the physical evidence from which all property boundaries are determined.

The Public Land Survey System was established by the federal government in 1785. In the early 1850’s the Initial Point for all surveys in Oregon and Washington, the Willamette Stone, and subsequently the Willamette Meridian, were established. This critical public infrastructure is regulated by the U.S. Department of Interior, Bureau of Land Management.

Public land corners are important because all property boundaries are tied to physical monuments. If destroyed, these corners must be re-established at the original location by a licensed surveyor. Public land corners are crucial for identifying property lines and directly impact:

Road development, designs, and boundaries
Map zoning and land development
Parcel, easement, lease and right-of-way boundaries
Resolution of property boundary disputes
Division of real property for sale
Accuracy of maps and GPS (global positioning system)

Public land corners are required by law

The Federal Government delegated the function of maintaining the public land corners to the states, and the state then delegated the function to the county surveyor of each county. The county surveyor must follow the Oregon Revised Statutes (ORS) in the management of a public land corner program, such as the following and not limited to:

ORS 209.070 Duties [of the county surveyor]
ORS 209.130 Establishment of corners
ORS 209.140 Necessary interference with corners or accessories
ORS 203.148 Public Land Corner Preservation Fund
ORS 105.718 Procedure for determining location of public land survey corner

The Oregon Public Land Corner Preservation Fund supports the establishment, reestablishment and maintenance of public land corners within county boundaries.

“Certainty in ownership boundaries for all public and private property in the county is at risk if public land corners are not maintained. They are the foundation of our land ownership system. Significant economic impact is the result of inattention to the monuments.”
- Pat Gaylord County Surveyor

Public land corner program is managed by the county surveyor’s office

J. Addison Pownall was elected as Clackamas County’s first county surveyor in 1857. In November 1998, Measure No. 3-6 Ordinance passed making the county surveyor an appointed position.

The surveyor’s office1 is responsible for:

maintaining the original public land corner monuments in the county
maintaining a library of county property survey records
reviewing all county surveys for compliance with Oregon survey filing law
reviewing and approving plats for all county land divisions, condominiums and property line adjustments

The restoration and maintenance of public land corners is an integral part of these duties. Public land corners are the foundation for which all other surveying and land development tasks supported by the county surveyor’s office are anchored by.

1 Clackamas County Surveyor’s Office

Observations

What is working for the public land corner program?

Tracking systems support an online interactive mapping tool to increase transparency and data accessibility.

There are approximately 7,430 public land corners in Clackamas County. To prioritize the restoration of public land corners that are the most urgent or are in areas that have the most impact on economic development, a priority boundary was formed. Former Clackamas County Surveyors established the priority boundary based on factors including the urban growth boundary and location of federal lands, such as the Mount Hood National Forest. Within the priority boundary, there are approximately 3,502 corners that Clackamas County actively manages. Corners outside of the priority boundary are supported on a request basis.

The public has access to a map showing the location of all public land corners in Clackamas County through the Clackamas County Public Land Corner History Research Tool.2 This tool is also used as a document library from which copies of original surveyor field notes, including those that date back to the 1840s, can be downloaded. Users can select a corner for further research either by entering the unique corner identification number or by selecting an area on a map and to identify which corners are in the selected area.

The work and services supported by the public land corner program impacts four of the five county strategic priorities.3

Public trust in good government – Transparency and access to information about public land corners is readily available on the county surveyor’s website.
Strong infrastructure – Public land corners affect land development, road projects, and can support efficient and accessible transit.
Vibrant economy – The foundation set by the public land corners impact land development and plat/subdivision approvals, including business development and expansion.
Safe, secure and livable communities – physical evidence of corners provide readily identifiable property lines to support livable communities

2Clackamas County Public Land Corners ArcGIS Web Experience

3Clackamas County Performance Clackamas

Three-person survey field crews achieved the highest number of corners restored in the recent decade.

In fiscal year 2024-2025, 78 corners were restored. This was the highest number of corners restored annually in the last ten years. The variation in the number of corners restored is tied to economic trends that affect the revenue and personnel.

Figure 1: Number of Corners Restored by Fiscal Year
Graph shows 20-year trend of corners restored.
Source: Developed by Clackamas County Office of County Internal Audit. Data provided by the Clackamas County Surveyor’s Office.

FY 07: 138
FY 08: 114
FY 09: 160
FY 10: 116
FY 11: 109
FY 12: 88
FY 13: 82
FY 14: 77
FY 15: 57
FY 16: 52
FY 17: 42
FY 18: 42
FY 19: 67
FY 20: 63
FY 21: 27
FY 22: 28
FY 23: 56
FY 24: 72
FY 25: 78
FY 26: 5 (partial year)

The three-person survey field crews approach capitalized on various field elements to enhance efficiency and effectiveness.

Task safety – Some public land corners are in the middle of busy roads and require road flaggers or closures. Three land surveyors together in the field supported field safety through enhanced awareness and the division of multiple duties.
Task duration – Some of the public land corners are in deep within the forest and require lengthy hikes covering various terrains. Teams of three reduced the number of trips to move equipment between the county vehicles, the corner being addressed, and multiple reference corners. It also increases safety in remote locations.
Staff training and mentorship – A three-surveyor field crew allowed for hands-on training and mentoring as corner restoration institutional knowledge was passed from the two experienced surveyors to the newer generation of surveyors.
Proactive restoration by geographic areas – Many corners are near other corners as there can be section corners, quarter-section corners, and Donation Land Claim corners in close proximity. As the surveyors conduct their research, multiple corners can be found in survey documents and maps. Surveyor teams maximized program impacts and results by setting up safety precautions, such as road flaggers and temporary road closures, to restore multiple corners in one day rather than addressing one corner at a time.

How can the public land corner program improve?

Program data integrity should be enhanced and supported by investment in data tracking systems and resources.

Four main systems are used to track all information pertaining to Clackamas County public land corners:

Binder with paper copies of maps – The maps were used to support decision-making activities for corner assignments. Once assigned, information about corners was inputted into Microsoft Access and Target. No further data was documented and updated in the binder
Microsoft Access – the database (named “activity log”) contains all surveyor activity in the last two decades, documenting various data points and key activity
Target – the document management system that retains all the documents related to all corners visited since the 1800s
ArcGIS Web Experience – the database that joins information from Target and Microsoft Access to push into the online interactive map of all public land corners

The systems combine manual and automated data entry and storage methods. There is limited integration between internal tracking systems. There is no integration between the Clackamas County tracking systems and those of other Oregon counties. Coordination on county lines for common corners is accomplished though records on file in each county.

The “activity log” tracks information about when the corner was last restored, which surveyors worked on it, when the survey document was filed, the type of monument used (e.g., bronze disc, iron pipe, etc.), and more. As many surveyors have had different styles for documenting and inputting data and with limited instructions or documented expectations, some data points within the activity log have a variety of formats representing the same information. For example, the naming of “Clackamas County Department of Transportation and Development” has been formatted in various ways, such as the following:

Clackamas County DTD
Clackamas County D.T.D
Clackamas County Department of Transportation
Clackamas Co. DTD
Clackamas Co. Dept. Transportation & Development

In addition to data description inconsistencies, one tracking system was noted to contain an erroneous duplicate corner entry during review of the full listing of public land corners in Clackamas County. Eleven public land corners were selected for review by performing in-person observations of the corners and walkthroughs of the documentation in the system. No other exceptions were noted in the sample selection.

Generating and analyzing reports from the three tracking systems is hampered by the time required to evaluate the data integrity and assess its adequacy. Per the Harvard Business School, “Data integrity is the accuracy, completeness, and quality of data as it’s maintained over time and across formats.”4 Having strong data integrity is vital for making quality data-driven decisions and for being efficient when conducting data analytics or data mining.

Program data supports more than in-field activities, construction and development decisions and boundary clarifications. Tracking program data provides insight into operational efficiency, helps identify risks, enables demonstrated impact to the public and ensures accountability. Supporting software capabilities—both internally in the tracking systems and externally on the interactive map—through program add-ons or by purchasing new software can enhance user experience and functionality.

4 Harvard Business School Online: What Is Data Integrity and Why Does It Matter?