Terms Used In California Codes > Public Resources Code > Division 15 > Chapter 2 - Definitions

• Affirmed: In the practice of the appellate courts, the decree or order is declared valid and will stand as rendered in the lower court.
• Aggrieved party: means a party entitled to pursue a remedy. See California Commercial Code 1201
• agreement: means the total legal obligation that results from the parties' agreement as determined by this code and as supplemented by any other applicable laws. See California Commercial Code 1201
• 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.
• assessed value: means 25 percent of full value to, and including, the 1980-81 fiscal year, and 100 percent of full value for the 1981-82 fiscal year and fiscal years thereafter. See California Government Code 25
• Bill of lading: means a document evidencing the receipt of goods for shipment issued by a person engaged in the business of transporting or forwarding goods. See California Commercial Code 1201
• Clerk: means the clerk of the supervising authority. See California Government Code 58004
• Commercial unit: means such a unit of goods as by commercial usage is a single whole for purposes of lease and division of which materially impairs its character or value on the market or in use. See California Commercial Code 10103
• Consumer lease: means a lease that a lessor regularly engaged in the business of leasing or selling makes to a lessee who is an individual and who takes under the lease primarily for a personal, family, or household purpose. See California Commercial Code 10103
• Continuance: Putting off of a hearing ot trial until a later time.
• contract: means the bargain of the parties in fact, as found in their language or inferred from other circumstances, including course of performance, course of dealing, or usage of trade as provided in Section 1303. See California Commercial Code 1201
• 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.
• Defensible space: means the area adjacent to a structure or dwelling where wildfire prevention or protection practices are implemented to provide defense from an approaching wildfire or to minimize the spread of a structure fire to wildlands or surrounding areas. See California Government Code 51177
• Director: means the Director of Forestry and Fire Protection. See California Government Code 51177
• Discovery: Lawyers' examination, before trial, of facts and documents in possession of the opponents to help the lawyers prepare for trial.
• District: means a tax or assessment district. See California Government Code 58004
• economic opportunity: means any of the following:

  California Government Code 52200.2

• 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.
• executed: when used with respect to the documents filed pursuant to this code or pursuant to regulations adopted under this code, and presented to the Secretary of State, include a document bearing a signature under subdivision (a). See California Corporations Code 17.1
• Executor: A male person named in a will to carry out the decedent
• Fair market value: The price at which an asset would change hands in a transaction between a willing, informed buyer and a willing, informed seller.
• Fiduciary: A trustee, executor, or administrator.
• Finance lease: means a lease with respect to which (A) the lessor does not select, manufacture, or supply the goods, (B) the lessor acquires the goods or the right to possession and use of the goods in connection with the lease, and (C) one of the following occurs:

  California Commercial Code 10103

• 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.
• Fraud: Intentional deception resulting in injury to another.
• Fuel: means any combustible material, including petroleum-based products, cultivated landscape plants, grasses, and weeds, and wildland vegetation. See California Government Code 51177
• Gift: A voluntary transfer or conveyance of property without consideration, or for less than full and adequate consideration based on fair market value.
• Goods: means all things that are movable at the time of identification to the lease contract, or are fixtures (Section 10309), but the term does not include money, documents, instruments, accounts, chattel paper, general intangibles, or minerals or the like, including oil and gas, before extraction. See California Commercial Code 10103
• 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.
• Insolvent: means :

  California Commercial Code 1201

• Installment lease contract: means a lease contract that authorizes or requires the delivery of goods in separate lots to be separately accepted, even though the lease contract contains a clause "each delivery is a separate lease" or its equivalent. See California Commercial Code 10103
• Lease: means a transfer of the right to possession and use of goods for a term in return for consideration, but a sale, including a sale on approval or a sale or return, or retention or creation of a security interest is not a lease. See California Commercial Code 10103
• 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}
• Lease agreement: means the bargain, with respect to the lease, of the lessor and the lessee in fact as found in their language or by implication from other circumstances including course of dealing or usage of trade or course of performance as provided in this division. See California Commercial Code 10103
• Lease contract: means the total legal obligation that results from the lease agreement as affected by this division and any other applicable rules of law. See California Commercial Code 10103
• Legislative body: as used in this division , means board of supervisors in the case of a county or city and county, and city council or board of trustees in the case of a city, unless the context otherwise requires. See California Government Code 50002
• Lessee: means a person who acquires the right to possession and use of goods under a lease. See California Commercial Code 10103
• Lessor: means a person who transfers the right to possession and use of goods under a lease. See California Commercial Code 10103
• Litigation: A case, controversy, or lawsuit. Participants (plaintiffs and defendants) in lawsuits are called litigants.
• Local agency: as used in this division means county, city, or city and county, unless the context otherwise requires. See California Government Code 50001
• Local agency: means a city, county, city and county, or district responsible for fire protection within a very high fire hazard severity zone. See California Government Code 51177
• Lot: means a parcel or a single article that is the subject matter of a separate lease or delivery, whether or not it is sufficient to perform the lease contract. See California Commercial Code 10103
• Merchant lessee: means a lessee that is a merchant with respect to goods of the kind subject to the lease. See California Commercial Code 10103
• Money: means a medium of exchange that is currently authorized or adopted by a domestic or foreign government. See California Commercial Code 1201
• Mortgage: The written agreement pledging property to a creditor as collateral for a loan.
• 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: includes joint owner, co-owner, guardian, executor, administrator, or other person holding property in trust under court appointment. See California Government Code 58004
• Person: means an individual, corporation, business trust, estate, trust, partnership, limited liability company, association, joint venture, government, governmental subdivision, agency, or instrumentality, or any other legal or commercial entity. See California Commercial Code 1201
• Person: includes a corporation as well as a natural person. See California Corporations Code 18
• Personal property: All property that is not real property.
• Plaintiff: The person who files the complaint in a civil lawsuit.
• Present value: means the amount as of a date certain of one or more sums payable in the future, discounted to the date certain. See California Commercial Code 10103
• Principal act: means the law providing for the creation of a particular district or type of district. See California Government Code 58004
• Process: includes a writ or summons issued in the course of judicial proceedings of either a civil or criminal nature. See California Government Code 22
• Project: means the work, improvement, or acquisition, or any combination thereof undertaken by a district. See California Government Code 58004
• Purchase: includes taking by sale, lease, mortgage, security interest, pledge, gift, or any other voluntary transaction creating an interest in goods. See California Commercial Code 10103
• Purchaser: means a person that takes by purchase. See California Commercial Code 1201
• Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
• Refunding warrants: refers to warrants drawn by the Controller on the General Fund pursuant to this article to provide funds for the payment of reimbursement warrants bearing a fixed maturity date or warrants issued pursuant to Section 17211. See California Government Code 17240
• Reimbursement warrants: refers to warrants drawn by the Controller on the General Fund pursuant to this article to reimburse the General Cash Revolving Fund for demands against the General Fund for which warrants were drawn against the General Cash Revolving Fund. See California Government Code 17240
• Remedy: means any remedial right to which an aggrieved party is entitled with or without resort to a tribunal. See California Commercial Code 1201
• Requisite number of petitioners: means the number of qualified petitioners prescribed by the principal act. See California Government Code 58004
• Right: includes remedy. See California Commercial Code 1201
• Right of offset: Banks' legal right to seize funds that a guarantor or debtor may have on deposit to cover a loan in default. It is also known as the right of set-off. ^{Source: OCC}
• Security interest: includes any interest of a consignor and a buyer of accounts, chattel paper, a payment intangible, or a promissory note in a transaction that is subject to Division 9 (commencing with Section 9101). See California Commercial Code 1201
• Service of process: The service of writs or summonses to the appropriate party.
• Settlement: Parties to a lawsuit resolve their difference without having a trial. Settlements often involve the payment of compensation by one party in satisfaction of the other party's claims.
• Signature: includes mark when the signer cannot write, such signer's name being written near the mark by a witness who writes his own name near the signer's name. See California Corporations Code 17
• State: means the State of California, unless applied to the different parts of the United States. See California Education Code 77
• State: means a state of the United States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the United States Virgin Islands, or any territory or insular possession subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. See California Commercial Code 1201
• Statute: A law passed by a legislature.
• Statute of limitations: A law that sets the time within which parties must take action to enforce their rights.
• Supervising authority: means the board of supervisors of the county in which is situated all or most of the land in a district, or body authorized by law to initiate or hear proceedings for the creation of a district. See California Government Code 58004
• Supplier: means a person from whom a lessor buys or leases goods to be leased under a finance lease. See California Commercial Code 10103
• Term: means a portion of an agreement that relates to a particular matter. See California Commercial Code 1201
• third party: means a person that has engaged in a transaction or made an agreement subject to this code. See California Commercial Code 1201
• Unapplied money: means money in the General Fund in the treasury for which outstanding warrants have not already been drawn and which would remain in the General Fund if all outstanding warrants theretofore drawn were paid. See California Government Code 17220
• Vegetation: means all plants, including trees, shrubs, grass, and perennial or annual plants. See California Government Code 51177
• Wildfire: means an unplanned, unwanted wildland fire, including unauthorized human-caused fires, escaped wildland fire use events, escaped prescribed fire projects, and all other wildland fires where the objective is to extinguish the fire. See California Government Code 51177
• Writing: includes printing, typewriting, or any other intentional reduction to tangible form. See California Commercial Code 1201