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On Ethics: You Be the Judge
How to Select the Best Route
Situation
Frank Turner is a professional engineer with JKL Engineering. JKL Engineering has a contract with the state to specify the route for a road connecting two towns. Turner determines that the shortest workable route would save approximately 30 minutes from what would otherwise be a two-hour trip. To build the shortest route, however, the state would be required to address the impact to a historic family farmhouse that has existed for over 100 years on the land required for the route. Turner visits the farmhouse’s owner, who indicates that the family has no interest in selling the farmhouse to the state or to anyone else. Turner is aware that the option exists for the state to exercise eminent domain, condemn the farmhouse, and allow the state to proceed with the design and construction of the new route between the two towns.
What Do You Think?
What are Turner’s ethical obligations under the circumstances?
What the Board of Ethical Review Said
It is not uncommon for professional engineers to be thrust into situations that involve the potential for public controversy and concern, either on an individual basis or more broadly, affecting the larger community. When confronted with such situations, professional engineers have an obligation to be honest and objective in their professional statements and activities.
In BER Case 79-2, Engineer A, the town engineer, and Engineer B, a consulting engineer retained by the town council, collaborated on an assignment to make studies and determine final contours for an existing sanitary landfill. After rejecting several designs, the town council requested Engineers A and B to prepare a new design. This new design was opposed by Engineer C, a town resident, for environmental reasons.
In deciding that all professional engineers involved acted ethically, the Board noted: “[T]here is no finite answer to the balance or ‘trade-off’ which is involved in the overall concerns about Case No. 79-2 environmental dangers for particular projects. At the federal, state, and local levels there is a growing body of law and regulation designed to establish governing criteria. But despite these efforts professional judgment will be the final arbiter of the best balance between society’s needs for certain facilities and the level of environmental degradation which may be unavoidable in filling those basic needs.”
More recently, in BER Case 05-4, an engineer was retained by a developer for a major waterfront development project in City X. As part of the process for approving the project, the engineer made a presentation and responded to questions from members of the City Planning Board. The engineer highlighted the improved environmental effect of converting the waterfront from an industrial facility to a parkland. However, the engineer was not asked, nor did he volunteer, that the development could increase traffic and pollution. Had the engineer been questioned by the City Planning Board, she would have provided testimony about these issues. Later, other witnesses (including other engineers) testified about the increased traffic, noise, and air pollution issues.
In deciding that it was not unethical for the engineer to not volunteer the potential for increased traffic and pollution, the BER said that engineers can reach different conclusions when looking at the same set of facts. The Board of Ethical Review concluded the engineer’s ethical obligation does not require her to disclose such information if, in her professional judgment, it is not “relevant and pertinent.”
In the present case, the Board of Ethical Review believes that Turner has an ethical obligation to balance the interests of all interested and relevant parties, including the state, the two towns involved, and the owners of the historic farmhouse. While in general the Board is of the view that the rule in favor of the greatest good for the greatest number should prevail under the circumstances as those presented in this case—which would suggest potential condemnation proceedings—there may be other creative solutions to address the issue. These might include an offer to physically move the historic farmhouse to another appropriate site owned by the family or another party.
Conclusion
Turner has an obligation to advise the state on all feasible and reasonable solutions in an attempt to reach an amicable resolution of this matter, consistent with the interests of the public, including physically moving the historic farmhouse to another appropriate site owned by the family or another party.
NSPE Code References
Section II.1., Section II.3., Section II.4., Section III.2., and Section III.2.a.
For more information, see Case No. 15-12.
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