Texas Senate Bill SB 687

Texas 2025 - 89th Regular

• Filed: 12/20/24
• Out of Senate Committee: 3/5/25
• Voted on by Senate: 4/10/25
• Out of House Committee: 5/13/25
• Voted on by House: 5/20/25
• Governor Action: 5/30/25

Caption

Relating to liability for land surveying services in or in connection with certain construction or services contracts.

Summary

SB 687 expands Texas construction-contract liability rules to expressly include land surveyors alongside architects and engineers. The bill updates definitions and multiple provisions in Chapter 130 of the Civil Practice and Remedies Code so that contracts involving land surveying services are treated the same as contracts for architectural and engineering services for purposes of indemnity, defense, insurance, and standard-of-care requirements. The bill generally voids contract clauses that would require a contractor to indemnify or hold harmless a land surveyor for damages caused by defects in plans or by the surveyor’s professional negligence, and it also limits clauses that would require a land surveyor to defend others against claims based on another party’s negligence or breach. At the same time, it preserves certain exceptions, including provisions allowing reimbursement of attorney’s fees in proportion to liability, additional-insured requirements where allowed by insurance policies, and defenses tied to negligent hiring claims. The bill also applies these rules to governmental contracts under Local Government Code Section 271.904, extending the same protections and limits to land surveying services performed for public agencies. SB 687 also codifies a professional standard of care for land surveying services. Contracts for surveying services must require performance with the skill and care ordinarily provided by competent surveyors under similar circumstances, and any attempt to impose a different standard is void and replaced by the statutory standard. The bill further clarifies that these changes apply only to contracts entered into on or after September 1, 2025, leaving existing agreements governed by prior law. The overall sentiment around the bill appears strongly favorable and noncontroversial. It passed the Senate unanimously and the House overwhelmingly, with no recorded opposition in either chamber. The vote history suggests broad bipartisan support and little, if any, public resistance. There is little evidence of contention in the available record. The main substantive issue is the scope of liability allocation in construction and public-works contracts, particularly whether land surveyors should receive the same anti-indemnity and standard-of-care protections already afforded to architects and engineers. The bill appears to have been framed as a technical but important alignment of the law rather than a disputed policy change.

Impact

SB 687 amends Chapter 130 of the Civil Practice and Remedies Code and Section 271.904 of the Local Government Code to add land surveyors to Texas’s construction-contract liability framework. It extends anti-indemnity protections, defense limitations, insurance provisions, and statutory professional standard-of-care rules to land surveying services, and it applies those rules to both private construction contracts and contracts involving governmental agencies. The bill affects owners, contractors, architects, engineers, land surveyors, and public entities by limiting certain risk-shifting clauses and standardizing how surveying services are treated in contract law.

Sentiment

The bill’s sentiment is overwhelmingly positive and procedural rather than contentious. It passed both chambers by very large margins, including unanimous Senate approval and near-unanimous House approval, indicating broad agreement that land surveyors should be covered by the same liability rules that already apply to architects and engineers. The absence of recorded opposition or committee controversy suggests the measure was viewed as a clarifying and harmonizing amendment to existing law.

Contention

No major contention is reflected in the available materials. The only likely point of policy debate is the balance between protecting land surveyors from expansive indemnity and defense obligations versus preserving flexibility for owners, contractors, and governmental agencies to allocate risk in construction and professional-services contracts. The bill preserves some owner and agency protections, such as additional-insured requirements and reimbursement tied to proportional liability, which likely helped avoid opposition.