The archive · Consumer Apps · Legal decision · 2022
MySitePlan bets unlicensed site maps are legal, then fights California in court
California fined Ryan Crownholm’s MySitePlan.com $1,000 for selling site-plan maps without a surveying license; he sued with the Institute for Justice.
MySitePlan.com
What the business is
MySitePlan.com sells ready-to-submit site-plan drawings for building and planning permits, produced remotely from public data — satellite imagery, online GIS layers and county parcel information — with a bold disclaimer that its plans are not legal surveys. Its customers are homeowners, contractors, restaurants planning outdoor seating and wedding venues whose building departments do not require a stamped surveyor, engineer or architect plan.
How it started
Founder Ryan Crownholm began his career as a contractor and learned to draw site plans because they are required with permit applications. He launched MySitePlan.com to sell that drawing as a service: customers who need an informal site map for a permit can order one instead of drafting it themselves, and the company's About page invites anyone whose building department does not require a surveyor, engineer or architect stamp.
What happened
In 2022 the California Board for Professional Engineers, Land Surveyors, and Geologists cited Crownholm for illegally practicing land surveying without a license, fined him $1,000 and ordered him to stop his business. The board read the license requirement as covering anyone who 'depicts the location of property lines' and the features within them — language Crownholm and his lawyers argued would make everyday GIS and map use illegal. With the Institute for Justice he sued the board in federal court with three claims: that the enforcement violates his First Amendment right to free speech, that California's definition of land surveying is unconstitutionally overbroad and vague, and, in the alternative, that it violates the Fourteenth Amendment by discriminating against people who draw their own site plans. They pointed to city building departments that publish do-it-yourself guides telling homeowners to use free online GIS data, asking why MySitePlan.com's drawings were illegal while the thousands of non-surveyor plans those departments accept were not.
No ending yet — it is still running.
Background
MySitePlan.com sells ready-to-submit site-plan drawings for building and planning permits, produced remotely from public data: satellite imagery, online GIS layers and county parcel information, with a disclaimer that its plans are not legal surveys. Founder Ryan Crownholm, a former contractor, launched it so homeowners, restaurants planning outdoor seating and wedding venues could outsource a drawing their building departments required without paying for a stamped survey.
The bet was that site-plan drawings are not surveying: redrawing information the public can already see needs no licensed surveyor, any more than the DIY plans building departments teach residents to draw themselves. In 2022 California's board for engineers, land surveyors and geologists disagreed, fining Crownholm $1,000 and ordering him to stop his business for practicing land surveying without a license.
Crownholm fought back in federal court with the Institute for Justice, arguing the board's reading of 'depicting property lines' would make everyday map and GIS use illegal and pointing out that local building departments publish guides for homeowners to draw their own site plans and accept thousands of non-surveyor submissions. As of the 2022-10-12 Vice report the suit was pending and the business was still operating while it litigated.
What has to be true
- Buyers only need a stamped survey when a building department demands one, so an unstamped drawing from public data serves a real class of permit applications.
- Building departments that publish DIY site-plan guides make the board's enforcement look arbitrary: the same drawing is illegal from a service and fine from a homeowner.
- Framing the case as free speech and vagueness under the First and Fourteenth Amendments turned a $1,000 fine into a constitutional test of occupational licensing.
- The public-data angle broadened the stakes beyond one contractor: a literal reading of the surveying law would reach GIS products, Zillow, Redfin and everyday map use.
What can be applied
When a regulator claims a routine task requires a credential, show the inconsistent enforcement: local building departments already accept thousands of unstamped site plans.
Aftermath
As of 2022-10-12 the case was unresolved: Crownholm told Motherboard that drawing site plans was how he had made his living for years, and that forcing him to stop would require building departments to change their own policies and would threaten map products from Zillow, Redfin and other companies using the same public data. The federal lawsuit against the California board was pending, and the Institute for Justice argued the action would set a harmful precedent for anyone who makes maps from public records.
Sources
- California Man Fined $1,000 for Drawing Lines on Maps
- California Man Fined $1,000 for Drawing Lines on Maps
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