Terms Used In New York Laws > Public Officers > Article 6 - Freedom of Information Law

• Agency: means any state or municipal department, board, bureau, division, commission, committee, public authority, public corporation, council, office or other governmental entity performing a governmental or proprietary function for the state or any one or more municipalities thereof, except the judiciary or the state legislature. See N.Y. Public Officers Law 86
• 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.
• Appellate: About appeals; an appellate court has the power to review the judgement of another lower court or tribunal.
• Arrest: Taking physical custody of a person by lawful authority.
• Assets: (1) The property comprising the estate of a deceased person, or (2) the property in a trust account.
• Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
• 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.
• Critical infrastructure: means systems, assets, places or things, whether physical or virtual, so vital to the state that the disruption, incapacitation or destruction of such systems, assets, places or things could jeopardize the health, safety, welfare or security of the state, its residents or its economy. See N.Y. Public Officers Law 86
• Entitlement: A Federal program or provision of law that requires payments to any person or unit of government that meets the eligibility criteria established by law. Entitlements constitute a binding obligation on the part of the Federal Government, and eligible recipients have legal recourse if the obligation is not fulfilled. Social Security and veterans' compensation and pensions are examples of entitlement programs.
• Joint committee: Committees including membership from both houses of teh legislature. Joint committees are usually established with narrow jurisdictions and normally lack authority to report legislation.
• Judiciary: means the courts of the state, including any municipal or district court, whether or not of record. See N.Y. Public Officers Law 86
• 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.
• Law enforcement agency: means a police agency or department of the state or any political subdivision thereof, including authorities or agencies maintaining police forces of individuals defined as police officers in § 1. See N.Y. Public Officers Law 86
• Law enforcement disciplinary proceeding: means the commencement of any investigation and any subsequent hearing or disciplinary action conducted by a law enforcement agency. See N.Y. Public Officers Law 86
• Law enforcement disciplinary records: means any record created in furtherance of a law enforcement disciplinary proceeding, including, but not limited to:
  
  (a) the complaints, allegations, and charges against an employee;
  
  (b) the name of the employee complained of or charged;
  
  (c) the transcript of any disciplinary trial or hearing, including any exhibits introduced at such trial or hearing;
  
  (d) the disposition of any disciplinary proceeding; and
  
  (e) the final written opinion or memorandum supporting the disposition and discipline imposed including the agency's complete factual findings and its analysis of the conduct and appropriate discipline of the covered employee. See N.Y. Public Officers Law 86
• Litigation: A case, controversy, or lawsuit. Participants (plaintiffs and defendants) in lawsuits are called litigants.
• Probation: A sentencing alternative to imprisonment in which the court releases convicted defendants under supervision as long as certain conditions are observed.
• Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
• Record: means any information kept, held, filed, produced or reproduced by, with or for an agency or the state legislature, in any physical form whatsoever including, but not limited to, reports, statements, examinations, memoranda, opinions, folders, files, books, manuals, pamphlets, forms, papers, designs, drawings, maps, photos, letters, microfilms, computer tapes or discs, rules, regulations or codes. See N.Y. Public Officers Law 86
• Retiree: means a former officer or employee of an agency, the state legislature, or the judiciary who was a member of a public retirement system of the state, as such term is defined in subdivision twenty-three of § 501 of the retirement and social security law and is receiving, or entitled to receive, a benefit from such public retirement system. See N.Y. Public Officers Law 86
• State legislature: means the legislature of the state of New York, including any committee, subcommittee, joint committee, select committee, or commission thereof. See N.Y. Public Officers Law 86
• Statute: A law passed by a legislature.
• 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.
• Trial: A hearing that takes place when the defendant pleads "not guilty" and witnesses are required to come to court to give evidence.