The Council of Landscape Architectural Registration Boards (CLARB) unequivocally supports the continued regulation of the landscape architecture profession.

Landscape Architecture Protects the Health, Safety, and Welfare of All Virginians

The practice of landscape architecture is a highly complex and technical design profession with overlaps in practice with architects and engineers.  The work of landscape architects includes keeping the public safe from hazards, protecting natural resources, and sustainably managing the natural and built environments surrounding our homes and communities. It requires a breadth of knowledge and training in many substantive areas of science, engineering, and aesthetics. The risks and consequences of negligent, unqualified, unethical, or incompetent persons engaging in landscape architectural design services without the requisite education and training are significant—sometimes irreparable—economically, environmentally, and in terms of the public safety, health, and welfare of all Virginians.

At stake are hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of infrastructure and site improvements every year, and the safety of persons and property these improvements affect. Licensure of landscape architects permits consumers to manage these risks, and reduce exposure for liability from hazardous and defective designs.

To properly serve and protect the public from these risks and consequences the potential for harm must be minimized and prevented. The public interest is best served when qualified, licensed professionals carry out these responsibilities safely in accordance with rigorous and essential professional standards, and when other non-qualified individuals are prevented from providing such services to the public. Moreover, licensing is necessary and appropriate given landscape architecture’s technical nature—and consumer/public inability to accurately and reliably assess the competence of such providers.  Without regulatory standards, consumers have no mechanism to ensure they can rely on a professional to produce design and technical documentation meeting minimum standards of competence.

LARE: Rigorous for a Reason

The Landscape Architect Registration Examination is a rigorous examination administered by CLARB ensuring all licensed landscape architects have met minimum levels of competency in Project and Construction Management, Inventory and Analysis, Design, and Grading, Drainage and Construction Documentation.   Landscape architects require the same rigor of testing as architects and civil engineers as they are all design disciplines with overlaps in practice.   

Landscape architects require this level of examination to properly and safely design and lead projects affecting people and property throughout the state of Virginia.  Landscape architects are also at the forefront of planning for and mitigating natural disasters and rising sea levels resulting from the changing climate.  They need the proper level of education, examination, and experience to adequately protect all Virginias.  It is CLARB’s belief that this will only be achieved by continuing to regulate the practice of landscape architecture throughout the Commonwealth.

Please see the attached statement from the The Interorganizational Council on Regulation (ICOR) in support of licensure for interior designers, landscape architects, architects, and engineers and surveyors.

https://www.clarb.org/docs/default-source/access-member-resources/august-2018-icor-statement.pdf