Terms Used In 24 CFR Part 570 - Community Development Block Grants

• 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.
• Amortization: Paying off a loan by regular installments.
• 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.
• 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.
• Assets: (1) The property comprising the estate of a deceased person, or (2) the property in a trust account.
• 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.
• Baseline: Projection of the receipts, outlays, and other budget amounts that would ensue in the future without any change in existing policy. Baseline projections are used to gauge the extent to which proposed legislation, if enacted into law, would alter current spending and revenue levels.
• 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}
• Bequest: Property gifted by will.
• Case law: The law as laid down in cases that have been decided in the decisions of the courts.
• Circumstantial evidence: All evidence except eyewitness testimony.
• Community Reinvestment Act: The Act is intended to encourage depository institutions to help meet the credit needs of the communities in which they operate, including low- and moderate-income neighborhoods. It was enacted by the Congress in 1977. ^{Source: OCC}
• Complaint: A written statement by the plaintiff stating the wrongs allegedly committed by the defendant.
• consumer product: includes any mechanical device which carries or conveys passengers along, around, or over a fixed or restricted route or course or within a defined area for the purpose of giving its passengers amusement, which is customarily controlled or directed by an individual who is employed for that purpose and who is not a consumer with respect to such device, and which is not permanently fixed to a site, but does not include such a device that is permanently fixed to a site. See 29 CFR 1983.101
• Continuance: Putting off of a hearing ot trial until a later time.
• 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.
• Credit Score: A number, roughly between 300 and 800, that measures an individual's credit worthiness. The most well-known type of credit score is the FICO score. This score represents the answer from a mathematical formula that assigns numerical values to various pieces of information in your credit report. ^{Source: OCC}
• 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.
• Dependent: A person dependent for support upon another.
• Devise: To gift property by will.
• Discovery: Lawyers' examination, before trial, of facts and documents in possession of the opponents to help the lawyers prepare for trial.
• Docket: A log containing brief entries of court proceedings.
• Donor: The person who makes a gift.
• 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.
• Equitable: Pertaining to civil suits in "equity" rather than in "law." In English legal history, the courts of "law" could order the payment of damages and could afford no other remedy. See damages. A separate court of "equity" could order someone to do something or to cease to do something. See, e.g., injunction. In American jurisprudence, the federal courts have both legal and equitable power, but the distinction is still an important one. For example, a trial by jury is normally available in "law" cases but not in "equity" cases. ^{Source: U.S. Courts}
• Escrow: Money given to a third party to be held for payment until certain conditions are met.
• 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.
• 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.
• Fee simple: Absolute title to property with no limitations or restrictions regarding the person who may inherit it.
• Fiduciary: A trustee, executor, or administrator.
• 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.
• Fixed Rate: Having a "fixed" rate means that the APR doesn't change based on fluctuations of some external rate (such as the "Prime Rate"). In other words, a fixed rate is a rate that is not a variable rate. A fixed APR can change over time, in several circumstances:
  • You are late making a payment or commit some other default, triggering an increase to a penalty rate
  • The bank changes the terms of your account and you do not reject the change.
  • The rate expires (if the rate was fixed for only a certain period of time).
• food: means all "food" as defined in 21 U. See 29 CFR 1983.101
• 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.
• 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}
• Gift: A voluntary transfer or conveyance of property without consideration, or for less than full and adequate consideration based on fair market value.
• Guarantor: A party who agrees to be responsible for the payment of another party's debts should that party default. ^{Source: OCC}
• 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}
• Judgement: The official decision of a court finally determining the respective rights and claims of the parties to a suit.
• 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.
• Mortgage: The written agreement pledging property to a creditor as collateral for a loan.
• National Bank: A bank that is subject to the supervision of the Comptroller of the Currency. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency is a bureau of the U.S. Treasury Department. A national bank can be recognized because it must have "national" or "national association" in its name. ^{Source: OCC}
• National Credit Union Administration: The federal regulatory agency that charters and supervises federal credit unions. (NCUA also administers the National Credit Union Share Insurance Fund, which insures the deposits of federal credit unions.) ^{Source: OCC}
• Oath: A promise to tell the truth.
• 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.
• Outlays: Outlays are payments made (generally through the issuance of checks or disbursement of cash) to liquidate obligations. Outlays during a fiscal year may be for payment of obligations incurred in prior years or in the same year.
• Oversight: Committee review of the activities of a Federal agency or program.
• 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.
• Personal property: All property that is not real property.
• 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.
• Probation: A sentencing alternative to imprisonment in which the court releases convicted defendants under supervision as long as certain conditions are observed.
• Public law: A public bill or joint resolution that has passed both chambers and been enacted into law. Public laws have general applicability nationwide.
• Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
• Recourse: An arrangement in which a bank retains, in form or in substance, any credit risk directly or indirectly associated with an asset it has sold (in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles) that exceeds a pro rata share of the bank's claim on the asset. If a bank has no claim on an asset it has sold, then the retention of any credit risk is recourse. ^{Source: FDIC}
• 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).
• 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.
• Statute: A law passed by a legislature.
• Testify: Answer questions in court.
• Testimony: Evidence presented orally by witnesses during trials or before grand juries.
• 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.
• Trustee: A person or institution holding and administering property in trust.
• Uniform Commercial Code: A set of statutes enacted by the various states to provide consistency among the states' commercial laws. It includes negotiable instruments, sales, stock transfers, trust and warehouse receipts, and bills of lading. ^{Source: OCC}
• Uphold: The decision of an appellate court not to reverse a lower court decision.
• Venue: The geographical location in which a case is tried.