Terms Used In Arizona Laws > Title 48 > Chapter 1 - General Provisions

• Action: includes any matter or proceeding in a court, civil or criminal. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Adult: means a person who has attained eighteen years of age. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Affirmed: In the practice of the appellate courts, the decree or order is declared valid and will stand as rendered in the lower court.
• Allegation: something that someone says happened.
• Amendment: A proposal to alter the text of a pending bill or other measure by striking out some of it, by inserting new language, or both. Before an amendment becomes part of the measure, thelegislature must agree to it.
• Annuity: A periodic (usually annual) payment of a fixed sum of money for either the life of the recipient or for a fixed number of years. A series of payments under a contract from an insurance company, a trust company, or an individual. Annuity payments are made at regular intervals over a period of more than one full year.
• Answer: The formal written statement by a defendant responding to a civil complaint and setting forth the grounds for defense.
• Appeal: A request made after a trial, asking another court (usually the court of appeals) to decide whether the trial was conducted properly. To make such a request is "to appeal" or "to take an appeal." One who appeals is called the appellant.
• Appraisal: A determination of property value.
• Appropriation: The provision of funds, through an annual appropriations act or a permanent law, for federal agencies to make payments out of the Treasury for specified purposes. The formal federal spending process consists of two sequential steps: authorization
• Arrest: Taking physical custody of a person by lawful authority.
• Attachment: A procedure by which a person's property is seized to pay judgments levied by the court.
• Bankruptcy: Refers to statutes and judicial proceedings involving persons or businesses that cannot pay their debts and seek the assistance of the court in getting a fresh start. Under the protection of the bankruptcy court, debtors may discharge their debts, perhaps by paying a portion of each debt. Bankruptcy judges preside over these proceedings.
• Beneficiary: A person who is entitled to receive the benefits or proceeds of a will, trust, insurance policy, retirement plan, annuity, or other contract. ^{Source: OCC}
• Board of directors: means the board having charge of the affairs of the district. See Arizona Laws 48-141
• Bond: means any bond issued pursuant to this article. See Arizona Laws 48-141
• Bonds: includes bonds, notes, temporary notes, temporary bonds, interim receipts, interim certificates, certificates of indebtedness, refunding notes, refunding bonds or other evidences of indebtedness or obligations of the district. See Arizona Laws 48-171
• Compensation: means money paid to an employee of a district for services in the form of a fixed salary or wages at the end of established pay periods, which, in the case of employees with fluctuating rates of pay, shall be considered as being the guaranteed rate of pay, and which, in the case of employees with dual rates, shall be for the primary occupation. See Arizona Laws 48-221
• Complaint: A written statement by the plaintiff stating the wrongs allegedly committed by the defendant.
• Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
• Contribution related to plant for pumping: means an amount computed as follows: There shall be determined a ratio per cent which is the total kilowatt hours sold or used for pumping including all pumping for municipal purposes, but excluding those kilowatt hours not produced by the district or by sources contractually available to the district but which are delivered to the district for transmission and distribution to others, divided by the total kilowatt hours sold or used, such totals to be for the latest five calendar years. See Arizona Laws 48-241
• Corporation: A legal entity owned by the holders of shares of stock that have been issued, and that can own, receive, and transfer property, and carry on business in its own name.
• Damages: Money paid by defendants to successful plaintiffs in civil cases to compensate the plaintiffs for their injuries.
• Dependent: A person dependent for support upon another.
• Discovery: Lawyers' examination, before trial, of facts and documents in possession of the opponents to help the lawyers prepare for trial.
• District: includes any irrigation district, drainage district, flood control district, agricultural improvement district, electrical district or power district, and in addition thereto any district, political subdivision, governmental agency, corporation or instrumentality of the state having territorial boundaries and created or organized for the purpose of benefiting or performing services for lands in the state. See Arizona Laws 48-171
• District: means any irrigation or agricultural improvement district located in a federal reclamation project, organized pursuant to law. See Arizona Laws 48-141
• District: means any irrigation, drainage, flood control, agricultural improvement, electrical, water conservation or power district organized under the laws of this state. See Arizona Laws 48-201
• District: includes any irrigation district, drainage district, flood control district, agricultural improvement district, electrical district, water conservation district or power district organized under the laws of this state. See Arizona Laws 48-121
• District: means any irrigation district, power district, electrical district or agricultural improvement district now or hereafter organized under the laws of this state which is directly engaged in the sale of electric power or energy other than for irrigation purposes. See Arizona Laws 48-241
• District: means an irrigation district, drainage district, flood control district, agricultural improvement district, electrical district, or power district organized pursuant to the laws of this state. See Arizona Laws 48-221
• District contributions: means sums of money paid by a district to finance a retirement plan. See Arizona Laws 48-221
• Employee: means a person in the service of a district whose customary employment is for an average of not less than thirty hours a week and for twelve months a year. See Arizona Laws 48-221
• Evidence: Information presented in testimony or in documents that is used to persuade the fact finder (judge or jury) to decide the case for one side or the other.
• Ex officio: Literally, by virtue of one's office.
• Executor: A male person named in a will to carry out the decedent
• Federal agency: means the United States, the president of the United States, the federal emergency administrator of public works, or any such agencies or instrumentalities as may be designated or created to make grants or loans, or both, pursuant to any act or acts of the Congress. See Arizona Laws 48-121
• Federal government: includes the United States, the president of the United States, the federal emergency administrator of public works, reconstruction finance corporation, or any agency, instrumentality or corporation of the United States, which has been or may be designated, created or authorized by or pursuant to any act or acts of the Congress, or which is owned or controlled, directly or indirectly, by the United States. See Arizona Laws 48-171
• Fiscal year: The fiscal year is the accounting period for the government. For the federal government, this begins on October 1 and ends on September 30. The fiscal year is designated by the calendar year in which it ends; for example, fiscal year 2006 begins on October 1, 2005 and ends on September 30, 2006.
• Garnishment: Generally, garnishment is a court proceeding in which a creditor asks a court to order a third party who owes money to the debtor or otherwise holds assets belonging to the debtor to turn over to the creditor any of the debtor
• Germane: On the subject of the pending bill or other business; a strict standard of relevance.
• Gift: A voluntary transfer or conveyance of property without consideration, or for less than full and adequate consideration based on fair market value.
• Governing body of the district: means the board of directors, board of trustees, district supervisors, or any other name by which the body charged with the administration of the affairs of a district may be known. See Arizona Laws 48-201
• Guardian: A person legally empowered and charged with the duty of taking care of and managing the property of another person who because of age, intellect, or health, is incapable of managing his (her) own affairs.
• including: means not limited to and is not a term of exclusion. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Interest rate: The amount paid by a borrower to a lender in exchange for the use of the lender's money for a certain period of time. Interest is paid on loans or on debt instruments, such as notes or bonds, either at regular intervals or as part of a lump sum payment when the issue matures. ^{Source: OCC}
• Jurisdiction: (1) The legal authority of a court to hear and decide a case. Concurrent jurisdiction exists when two courts have simultaneous responsibility for the same case. (2) The geographic area over which the court has authority to decide cases.
• Lease: A contract transferring the use of property or occupancy of land, space, structures, or equipment in consideration of a payment (e.g., rent). ^{Source: OCC}
• Liabilities: The aggregate of all debts and other legal obligations of a particular person or legal entity.
• Lien: A claim against real or personal property in satisfaction of a debt.
• Litigation: A case, controversy, or lawsuit. Participants (plaintiffs and defendants) in lawsuits are called litigants.
• Magistrate: means an officer having power to issue a warrant for the arrest of a person charged with a public offense and includes the chief justice and justices of the supreme court, judges of the superior court, judges of the court of appeals, justices of the peace and judges of a municipal court. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Minor: means a person under eighteen years of age. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Month: means a calendar month unless otherwise expressed. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Obligation: An order placed, contract awarded, service received, or similar transaction during a given period that will require payments during the same or a future period.
• Oversight: Committee review of the activities of a Federal agency or program.
• Participant: means an employee of a district who is eligible under the provisions of section 48-224 for participation in the retirement plan adopted by a district. See Arizona Laws 48-221
• Partnership: A voluntary contract between two or more persons to pool some or all of their assets into a business, with the agreement that there will be a proportional sharing of profits and losses.
• Person: means an individual, corporation, business trust, estate, trust, partnership, limited liability company, association, joint venture, public corporation, government or governmental subdivision, agency or instrumentality or any other legal or commercial entity. See Arizona Laws 11-487.01
• Person: means any individual, firm, partnership, joint venture, corporation or association. See Arizona Laws 48-201
• Person: includes a corporation, company, partnership, firm, association or society, as well as a natural person. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Personal property: includes money, goods, chattels, things in action and evidences of debt. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Personal property: All property that is not real property.
• Plaintiff: The person who files the complaint in a civil lawsuit.
• Plan: means a retirement plan authorized by section 48-222. See Arizona Laws 48-221
• Pleadings: Written statements of the parties in a civil case of their positions. In the federal courts, the principal pleadings are the complaint and the answer.
• Population: means the population according to the most recent United States decennial census. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Precedent: A court decision in an earlier case with facts and law similar to a dispute currently before a court. Precedent will ordinarily govern the decision of a later similar case, unless a party can show that it was wrongly decided or that it differed in some significant way.
• Prior service: means service for a district by any employee for any period not exceeding twenty-five years immediately prior to the adoption of a retirement plan. See Arizona Laws 48-221
• Process: means a citation, writ or summons issued in the course of judicial proceedings. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• professional services: includes architect services, engineer services, landscape architect services, assayer services, geologist services and land surveying services and any combination of those services. See Arizona Laws 48-281
• Property: includes both real and personal property. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Quorum: The number of legislators that must be present to do business.
• Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
• Remainder: An interest in property that takes effect in the future at a specified time or after the occurrence of some event, such as the death of a life tenant.
• State: means a state of the United States, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the United States Virgin Islands or any territory or insular possession subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. See Arizona Laws 11-487.01
• Statute: A law passed by a legislature.
• Summons: Another word for subpoena used by the criminal justice system.
• Termination of service: means the cessation of employment of an employee by a district, but service shall not be deemed terminated by reason of any military absence, or any leave of absence or furlough granted by the district. See Arizona Laws 48-221
• Testimony: Evidence presented orally by witnesses during trials or before grand juries.
• Total water costs: means one-third of the total sums of the following items for the latest three calendar years:

  (a) The operating and maintenance expense attributable to watershed maintenance and protection, water production and development, storage, transmission, distribution or conservation, including administrative and general and related costs, but excluding depreciation. See Arizona Laws 48-241

• Trustee: A person or institution holding and administering property in trust.
• Undertaking: means the purchase, construction, leasing or acquisition of any real or personal property, works or facilities which the district is authorized by law to purchase, construct, lease or otherwise acquire, or the improvement, reconstruction, extension or addition to any real or personal property, works or facilities owned or operated by the district, but does not include the purchase or acquisition by the exercise of the right of eminent domain or condemnation of any existing works or facilities, nor the purchase, construction, leasing or acquisition of, or the extension or addition of, works or facilities designed to serve areas or territories outside the boundaries of the federal reclamation project in which the district is located, or areas or territories already being served or which within twelve months past have been served by existing works or facilities belonging to others. See Arizona Laws 48-141
• United States: includes the District of Columbia and the territories. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Writing: includes printing. See Arizona Laws 1-215