Terms Used In Virginia Code > Title 42.1 > Chapter 7 - Virginia Public Records Act

• 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.
• Affordable housing: means , as a guideline, housing that is affordable to households with incomes at or below the area median income, provided that the occupant pays no more than thirty percent of his gross income for gross housing costs, including utilities. See Virginia Code 15.2-2201
• Agency: means all boards, commissions, departments, divisions, institutions, and authorities, and parts thereof, of the Commonwealth or its political subdivisions and includes the offices of constitutional officers. See Virginia Code 42.1-77
• 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.
• 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.
• Archives: means the program administered by The Library of Virginia for the preservation of archival records. See Virginia Code 42.1-77
• 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: means the State Library Board. See Virginia Code 42.1-77
• Charity: An agency, institution, or organization in existence and operating for the benefit of an indefinite number of persons and conducted for educational, religious, scientific, medical, or other beneficent purposes.
• City: means an independent incorporated community which became a city as provided by law before noon on July 1, 1971, or which has within defined boundaries a population of 5,000 or more and which has become a city as provided by law. See Virginia Code 1-208
• Coal producer: means any holder of an economic interest. See Virginia Code 58.1-3740
• Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
• Conviction: A judgement of guilt against a criminal defendant.
• 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.
• County: means any existing county or such unit hereafter created. See Virginia Code 15.2-102
• Custodian: means the public official in charge of an office having public records. See Virginia Code 42.1-77
• Deed: The legal instrument used to transfer title in real property from one person to another.
• Department: means the Department of Taxation. See Virginia Code 58.1-1
• Development: means a tract of land developed or to be developed as a unit under single ownership or unified control which is to be used for any business or industrial purpose or is to contain three or more residential dwelling units. See Virginia Code 15.2-2201
• Disaster plan: means the information maintained by an agency that outlines recovery techniques and methods to be followed in case of an emergency that impacts the agency's records. See Virginia Code 42.1-77
• Economic interest: means the interest possessed by a person who has acquired by capital investment any interest in the coal in place and secures, by any form of legal relationship, income from the extraction of the coal, to which he must look for a return of his capital. See Virginia Code 58.1-3740
• Electronic record: means a public record whose creation, storage, and access require the use of an automated system or device. See Virginia Code 42.1-77
• 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.
• Freedom of Information Act: A federal law that mandates that all the records created and kept by federal agencies in the executive branch of government must be open for public inspection and copying. The only exceptions are those records that fall into one of nine exempted categories listed in the statute. ^{Source: OCC}
• Governing body: means the board of supervisors of a county, council of a city, or council of a town, as the context may require. See Virginia Code 15.2-102
• Gross receipts: means the purchase price received by a coal producer for the sale of coal to an unaffiliated purchaser in an arm's-length transaction. See Virginia Code 58.1-3740
• in writing: include any representation of words, letters, symbols, numbers, or figures, whether (i) printed or inscribed on a tangible medium or (ii) stored in an electronic or other medium and retrievable in a perceivable form and whether an electronic signature authorized by Virginia Code 1-257
• Incentive zoning: means the use of bonuses in the form of increased project density or other benefits to a developer in return for the developer providing certain features, design elements, uses, services, or amenities desired by the locality, including but not limited to, site design incorporating principles of new urbanism and traditional neighborhood development, environmentally sustainable and energy-efficient building design, affordable housing creation and preservation, and historical preservation, as part of the development. See Virginia Code 15.2-2201
• Includes: means includes, but not limited to. See Virginia Code 1-218
• Injunction: An order of the court prohibiting (or compelling) the performance of a specific act to prevent irreparable damage or injury.
• 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}
• Librarian of Virginia: means the State Librarian of Virginia or his designated representative. See Virginia Code 42.1-77
• Lien: A claim against real or personal property in satisfaction of a debt.
• Lifecycle: means the creation, use, maintenance, and disposition of a public record. See Virginia Code 42.1-77
• Litigation: A case, controversy, or lawsuit. Participants (plaintiffs and defendants) in lawsuits are called litigants.
• Local planning commission: means a municipal planning commission or a county planning commission. See Virginia Code 15.2-2201
• Locality: means a county, city, or town as the context may require. See Virginia Code 1-221
• Month: means a calendar month and "year" means a calendar year. See Virginia Code 1-223
• Mortgage: The written agreement pledging property to a creditor as collateral for a loan.
• Non-local coal transportation and processing costs: includes the costs of transporting the coal from the county or city in which it was severed to the second county or city and the costs of cleaning, preparation, and processing that are incurred within that second county or city. See Virginia Code 58.1-3740
• Notary: means notary public. See Virginia Code 1-226
• 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.
• Original record: means the first generation of the information and is the preferred version of a record. See Virginia Code 42.1-77
• 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: includes any individual, corporation, partnership, association, cooperative, limited liability company, trust, joint venture, government, political subdivision, or any other legal or commercial entity and any successor, representative, agent, agency, or instrumentality thereof. See Virginia Code 1-230
• Personal property: All property that is not real property.
• Plaintiff: The person who files the complaint in a civil lawsuit.
• Preliminary subdivision plat: means the proposed schematic representation of development or subdivision that establishes how the provisions of §§ Virginia Code 15.2-2201
• Preservation: means the processes and operations involved in ensuring the technical and intellectual survival of authentic records through time. See Virginia Code 42.1-77
• Probable cause: A reasonable ground for belief that the offender violated a specific law.
• Process: includes subpoenas, the summons and complaint in a civil action, and process in statutory actions. See Virginia Code 1-237
• Public official: means all persons holding any office created by the Constitution of Virginia or by any act of the General Assembly, the Governor and all other officers of the executive branch of the state government, and all other officers, heads, presidents, or chairmen of boards, commissions, departments, and agencies of the state government or its political subdivisions. See Virginia Code 42.1-77
• real estate: includes lands, tenements and hereditaments, and all rights and appurtenances thereto and interests therein, other than a chattel interest. See Virginia Code 1-219
• Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
• record: means recorded information that documents a transaction or activity by or with any public officer, agency, or employee of an agency. See Virginia Code 42.1-77
• Records retention and disposition schedule: means a Library of Virginia-approved timetable stating the required retention period and disposition action of a records series. See Virginia Code 42.1-77
• Reenacted: when used in the title or enactment of a bill or act of the General Assembly, means that the changes enacted to a section of the Code of Virginia or an act of the General Assembly are in addition to the existing substantive provisions in that section or act, and are effective prospectively unless the bill expressly provides that such changes are effective retroactively on a specified date. See Virginia Code 1-238
• Revocable trust: A trust agreement that can be canceled, rescinded, revoked, or repealed by the grantor (person who establishes the trust).
• Site plan: means the proposal for a development or a subdivision including all covenants, grants or easements and other conditions relating to use, location and bulk of buildings, density of development, common open space, public facilities and such other information as required by the subdivision ordinance to which the proposed development or subdivision is subject. See Virginia Code 15.2-2201
• Special exception: means a special use that is a use not permitted in a particular district except by a special use permit granted under the provisions of this chapter and any zoning ordinances adopted herewith. See Virginia Code 15.2-2201
• State: when applied to a part of the United States, includes any of the 50 states, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, and the United States Virgin Islands. See Virginia Code 1-245
• state agency: means the same as that term is defined in § Virginia Code 1-206
• Street: means highway, street, avenue, boulevard, road, lane, alley, or any public way. See Virginia Code 15.2-2201
• Subpoena: A command to a witness to appear and give testimony.
• Subpoena duces tecum: A command to a witness to produce documents.
• sworn: means "affirm" or "affirmed. See Virginia Code 1-250
• Town: means any existing town or an incorporated community within one or more counties which became a town before noon, July one, nineteen hundred seventy-one, as provided by law or which has within defined boundaries a population of 1,000 or more and which has become a town as provided by law. See Virginia Code 15.2-102
• Town: means any existing town or an incorporated community within one or more counties which became a town before noon, July 1, 1971, as provided by law or which has within defined boundaries a population of 1,000 or more and which has become a town as provided by law. See Virginia Code 1-254
• Trustee: A person or institution holding and administering property in trust.
• United States: includes the 50 states, the District of Columbia the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands and the United States Virgin Islands. See Virginia Code 1-255
• Variance: means , in the application of a zoning ordinance, a reasonable deviation from those provisions regulating the shape, size, or area of a lot or parcel of land or the size, height, area, bulk, or location of a building or structure when the strict application of the ordinance would unreasonably restrict the utilization of the property, and such need for a variance would not be shared generally by other properties, and provided such variance is not contrary to the purpose of the ordinance. See Virginia Code 15.2-2201
• Working waterfront: means an area or structure on, over, or adjacent to navigable waters that provides access to the water and is used for water-dependent commercial, industrial, or governmental activities, including commercial and recreational fishing; tourism; aquaculture; boat and ship building, repair, and services; seafood processing and sales; transportation; shipping; marine construction; and military activities. See Virginia Code 15.2-2201