Terms Used In Nebraska Statutes > One-Call Notification System Act

• Action: shall include any proceeding in any court of this state. See Nebraska Statutes 49-801
• 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.
• 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
• Attorney: shall mean attorney at law. See Nebraska Statutes 49-801
• Bar test survey: means a leakage survey completed with a nonconductive piece of equipment made by manually driving small holes in the ground at regular intervals along the route of an underground gas pipe for the purpose of extracting a sample of the ground atmosphere and testing the atmosphere in the holes with a combustible gas detector or other suitable device. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2303.01
• Business day: shall mean any day other than a Saturday, Sunday, or state or nationally observed legal holiday. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2304
• Center: means a call center which shall have as its principal purpose the statewide receipt and dissemination to participating operators of information on a fair and uniform basis concerning intended excavations by excavators in areas where operators have underground facilities. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2305
• Committee: means the Underground Excavation Safety Committee. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2305.01
• Company: shall include any corporation, partnership, limited liability company, joint-stock company, joint venture, or association. See Nebraska Statutes 49-801
• 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.
• Damage: shall mean any impact with, partial or complete severance, destruction, impairment, or penetration of, or removal or weakening of support from an underground facility, including its protective coating, housing, or other protective device. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2306
• Damages: Money paid by defendants to successful plaintiffs in civil cases to compensate the plaintiffs for their injuries.
• Discovery: Lawyers' examination, before trial, of facts and documents in possession of the opponents to help the lawyers prepare for trial.
• Domestic: when applied to corporations shall mean all those created by authority of this state. See Nebraska Statutes 49-801
• Emergency condition: shall mean any condition which constitutes a clear and present danger to life, health, or property or which demands immediate action to prevent or repair a major service outage. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2307
• 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}
• 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.
• Excavation: shall mean any activity in which earth, rock, or other material in or on the ground is moved or otherwise displaced by means of tools, equipment, or explosives and shall include grading, trenching, digging, ditching, drilling, augering, tunneling, scraping, and cable or pipe plowing or driving but shall not include (1) normal maintenance of roads if the maintenance does not change the original road grade and does not involve the road ditch, (2) tilling of soil and gardening for seeding and other agricultural purposes, (3) digging of graves or in landfills in planned locations, (4) maintenance or rebuilding of railroad track or facilities located on a railroad right-of-way by the railroad company or its contractors when such maintenance or rebuilding does not change the track grade, or (5) hand digging around the base of a pole for pole inspection as part of routine maintenance or replacement of a pole when the replacement pole is similarly sized and is installed in the existing hole. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2308
• Excavator: shall mean a person who engages in excavation in this state. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2309
• 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).
• Gas or hazardous liquid underground pipeline facility: shall mean any underground facility used or intended for use in the transportation of gas or the treatment of gas or used or intended for use in the transportation of hazardous liquids including petroleum or petroleum products. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2310
• Gift: A voluntary transfer or conveyance of property without consideration, or for less than full and adequate consideration based on fair market value.
• 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}
• Locator: means a person who identifies and marks underground facilities for an operator, including a contractor who performs such location services for an operator. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2310.01
• Nonpermanent surface: shall mean any ground consisting of uncovered dirt or rock or ground that is covered by grass or other plant life, crushed rock, gravel, or other similar natural substance. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2311
• Normal working hours: shall mean the hours of 7 a. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2312
• 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.
• Operator: shall mean a person who manages or controls the functions of an underground facility but shall not include a person who is an owner or tenant of real property where underground facilities are located if the underground facilities are used exclusively to furnish services or commodities on the real property. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2313
• Operator shall mean a person who manages or controls the functions of an underground facility but shall not: include a person who is an owner or tenant of real property where underground facilities are located if the underground facilities are used exclusively to furnish services or commodities on the real property. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2313
• 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.
• Permanent surface: shall mean any ground that is covered by a hard, artificial, weatherproof material such as concrete, asphalt, or other similar artificial substance. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2314
• Person: means an individual, partnership, limited liability company, association, municipality, state, county, political subdivision, utility, joint venture, or corporation and shall include the employer, employee, or contractor of an individual. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2315
• Person: shall include bodies politic and corporate, societies, communities, the public generally, individuals, partnerships, limited liability companies, joint-stock companies, and associations. See Nebraska Statutes 49-801
• Person shall: include bodies politic and corporate, societies, communities, the public generally, individuals, partnerships, limited liability companies, joint-stock companies, and associations. See Nebraska Statutes 49-801
• Personal property: All property that is not real property.
• Process: shall mean a summons, subpoena, or notice to appear issued out of a court in the course of judicial proceedings. See Nebraska Statutes 49-801
• Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
• 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.
• State: when applied to different states of the United States shall be construed to extend to and include the District of Columbia and the several territories organized by Congress. See Nebraska Statutes 49-801
• Statute: A law passed by a legislature.
• Subpoena: A command to a witness to appear and give testimony.
• Testimony: Evidence presented orally by witnesses during trials or before grand juries.
• Ticket: means the compilation of data received by the center in the notice of excavation and the facility locations provided to the center and which is assigned a unique identifying number. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2316.01
• Tort: A civil wrong or breach of a duty to another person, as outlined by law. A very common tort is negligent operation of a motor vehicle that results in property damage and personal injury in an automobile accident.
• Trial: A hearing that takes place when the defendant pleads "not guilty" and witnesses are required to come to court to give evidence.
• Underground facility: shall mean any item of personal property buried or placed below ground for use in connection with the storage or conveyance of water, sewage, electronic communications, telephonic communications, telegraphic communications, cable television, electric energy, oil, gas, hazardous liquids, or other substances, including pipes, trunk lines, fiber optic cables, sewers, conduits, cables, valves, lines, wires, manholes, and attachments to such personal property. See Nebraska Statutes 76-2317
• United States: shall include territories, outlying possessions, and the District of Columbia. See Nebraska Statutes 49-801
• Year: shall mean calendar year. See Nebraska Statutes 49-801