Terms Used In Arizona Laws > Title 48 > Chapter 6 > Article 1 - In General

• Action: includes any matter or proceeding in a court, civil or criminal. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Affidavit: A written statement of facts confirmed by the oath of the party making it, before a notary or officer having authority to administer oaths.
• 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.
• 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
• assessment roll: means a special assessment made under this article. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• Attachment: A procedure by which a person's property is seized to pay judgments levied by the court.
• Attorney-in-fact: A person who, acting as an agent, is given written authorization by another person to transact business for him (her) out of 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.
• Block: means a parcel of ground, regular or irregular, bounded by streets or by streets and district boundary lines. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• Chairman of the board: means the person designated to preside over meetings of the board of directors. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• Commercial farming: means the intensive cultivation of arable land by the raising of agricultural or horticultural products as a principal source of the owner's livelihood. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• Commercial stock raising: means the breeding, raising and care of domestic animals as a principal source of the owner's livelihood. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
• Contractor: includes personal representatives or assignee of the contractor. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• 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.
• Deed: The legal instrument used to transfer title in real property from one person to another.
• Defendant: In a civil suit, the person complained against; in a criminal case, the person accused of the crime.
• Delinquency: means delinquency in the payment of an assessment. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• Deposition: An oral statement made before an officer authorized by law to administer oaths. Such statements are often taken to examine potential witnesses, to obtain discovery, or to be used later in trial.
• district engineer: means a person designated or employed by the board of directors of a district to perform any or all of the engineering work authorized to be done by the district under this article. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• 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.
• 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.
• Foreclosure: A legal process in which property that is collateral or security for a loan may be sold to help repay the loan when the loan is in default. ^{Source: OCC}
• Fraud: Intentional deception resulting in injury to another.
• Gift: A voluntary transfer or conveyance of property without consideration, or for less than full and adequate consideration based on fair market value.
• Grantee: includes every person to whom an estate or interest in real property passes, in or by a deed. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• 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.
• improvement: includes any of the improvements mentioned and authorized to be made in this article, the construction, reconstruction and repair of all or any portion of any such improvement, and labor, services, expenses and material necessary or incidental thereto. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• 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.
• Lighting plants: includes electric light plants, electric power plants, gas plants, distribution systems, poles, parts, pipes, conduits, wires, tanks, reservoirs, generators for gas or electricity, transmission lines, towers, lamps, transformers of every character, machinery, apparatus, equipment and all appliances and structures necessary or incidental to the construction, installation or operation of a complete electric light, power and gas plant and distribution system placed on the streets improved, though extended beyond. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• Lot: includes any portion, piece, parcel or subdivision of land, but not property owned or controlled by any person as a railroad right of way. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• 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.
• Owner: means the person in whom legal title appears by recorded deed, or the person in possession under claim or title, or the person exercising acts of ownership for himself or as the personal representative of the owner, including the boards of trustees of school districts and the boards of education of high school districts owning property within the proposed improvement district. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• 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.
• 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.
• Process: means a citation, writ or summons issued in the course of judicial proceedings. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Property: includes both real and personal property. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
• Recess: A temporary interruption of the legislative business.
• 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.
• Reporter: Makes a record of court proceedings and prepares a transcript, and also publishes the court's opinions or decisions (in the courts of appeals).
• Sewers: includes wastewater treatment facilities, tunnels, excavations, ditches, drains, conduits, channels, outlets, outfalls, cesspools, manholes, catch basins, flush tanks, septic tanks, connecting sewers of every character, machinery, apparatus, equipment and all appliances and structures necessary or incidental to the construction, installation or operation of a complete sewer system for either sanitary or drainage purposes. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• Statute of limitations: A law that sets the time within which parties must take action to enforce their rights.
• Street: includes avenues, alleys, highways, lanes, crossings, intersections, courts, places and grounds opened or dedicated to public use and public ways. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• Subpoena: A command to a witness to appear and give testimony.
• superintendent: means a county employee designated by the board of supervisors to perform the duties of street superintendent for all the districts organized under this article in any county. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• Transcript: A written, word-for-word record of what was said, either in a proceeding such as a trial or during some other conversation, as in a transcript of a hearing or oral deposition.
• Trustee: A person or institution holding and administering property in trust.
• Unincorporated area: means any portion of a county not within the limits of an incorporated city or town, so situated that any of the improvements provided for in this article might reasonably or properly be made or constructed for the benefit of the inhabitants of the area under existing special assessment statutes if the area were situated within an incorporated city or town. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• United States: includes the District of Columbia and the territories. See Arizona Laws 1-215
• User fees: Fees charged to users of goods or services provided by the government. In levying or authorizing these fees, the legislature determines whether the revenue should go into the treasury or should be available to the agency providing the goods or services.
• Wastewater systems: means sewers and other wastewater treatment facilities. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• Waterworks: means works for the storage or development of water for domestic uses, including drinking water treatment facilities, wells, pumping machinery, power plants, pipelines and all equipment necessary for those purposes. See Arizona Laws 48-901
• Writing: includes printing. See Arizona Laws 1-215