Arcpy.da.SearchCursor() help when attribute doesn't exist

Question

I'm updating text elements off of an arcpy.da.SearchCursor script and needed to construct the script to return a response for when the attribute does NOT exist. Here is the snippet of the code THAT WORKS:

fcWO = r"W:\\GIS_Projects\\Impervious_Surfaces_Tables\\SUM_WORKORDER"
field1 = "SURFACE_TYPE"
field2 = "SUM_SQ_FT"

valueB = r"N/A"
valueM = r"N/A"
valueP = r"N/A"
valueS = r"N/A"
valueR = r"N/A"

with arcpy.da.SearchCursor(fcWO, (field1, field2)) as cursor:
    for row in cursor:
        if row[0] == "BUILDING":
            valueB = row[1]
        elif row[0] == "MISC":
            valueM = row[1]
        elif row[0] == "PARKING":
            valueP = row[1]
        elif row[0] == "ROAD":
            valueR = row[1]
        elif row[0] == "SIDEWALK":
            valueS = row[1]

for elm in arcpy.mapping.ListLayoutElements(mxd,"TEXT_ELEMENT"):
    if elm.name == 'Building':
        elm.text = valueB
    elif elm.name == 'Misc':
        elm.text = valueM
    elif elm.name == 'Parking':
        elm.text = valueP
    elif elm.name == 'Roadway':
        elm.text = valueR
    elif elm.name == 'Sidwalk':
        elm.text = valueS

Answer 1

To continue with your code sample:

import arcpy

mxd = arcpy.mapping.MapDocument("Current")
fc = r"W:\\GIS_Projects\\Impervious_Surfaces_Tables\\TOTAL"
field1 = "SURFACE_TYPE"
field2 = "SUM_SQ_FT"
value = ""

with arcpy.da.SearchCursor(fc, [field1, field2]) as cursor:
     for row in cursor:
         if row[0] == "BUILDING":
              value = str(row[1])

for elm in arcpy.mapping.ListLayoutElements(mxd,"TEXT_ELEMENT"):
     if elm.name == 'Total':
          elm.text = value

arcpy.RefreshActiveView()

THIS WORKS!:

import arcpy

mxd = arcpy.mapping.MapDocument("Current")
fc = r"W:\\GIS_Projects\\Impervious_Surfaces_Tables\\TOTAL"
field1 = "SURFACE_TYPE"
field2 = "SUM_SQ_FT"

valueB = r"N/A"
valueM = r"N/A"
valueP = r"N/A"
valueS = r"N/A"
valueR = r"N/A"

with arcpy.da.SearchCursor(fc, (field1, field2)) as cursor:
     for row in cursor:
         if row[0] == "BUILDING":
              valueB = str(row[1]
         elif row[0] == "MISC":
              valueM = str(row[1]
         elif row[0] == "PARKING":
              valueP = str(row[1]
         elif row[0] == "ROAD":
              valueR = str(row[1]
         elif row[0] == "SIDEWALK":
              valueS = str(row[1]

for elm in arcpy.mapping.ListLayoutElements(mxd,"TEXT_ELEMENT"):
    if elm.name == 'Building':
        elm.text = valueB
    elif elm.name == 'Misc':
        elm.text = valueM
    elif elm.name == 'Parking':
        elm.text = valueP
    elif elm.name == 'Roadway':
        elm.text = valueR
    elif elm.name == 'Sidewalk':
        elm.text = valueS

arcpy.RefreshActiveView()

If you print the map after you refresh it I would suggest to set all the text elements back to "N/A". It would be the same code as above, just with

elm.text = r"N/A"