Terms Used In Tennessee Code > Title 65 > Chapter 31 - Underground Utility Damage Prevention Act

• Agriculture: means :
  (i) The land, buildings and machinery used in the commercial production of farm products and nursery stock. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Animal: means a domesticated living creature or a wild creature previously captured. See Tennessee Code 39-14-201
• 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.
• Benefit: means anything reasonably regarded as economic gain, enhancement or advantage, including benefit to any other person in whose welfare the beneficiary is interested. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• Blasting: means the use of an explosive device for the excavation of earth, rock, or other material or the demolition of a structure. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Board: means the underground utility damage enforcement board, created by §. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Bodily injury: includes a cut, abrasion, bruise, burn or disfigurement, and physical pain or temporary illness or impairment of the function of a bodily member, organ, or mental faculty. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• Calendar day: means a twenty-four (24) hour period beginning with the date and time that a notification to excavate or demolish is to begin, including Monday through Sunday and all holidays. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Code: includes the Tennessee Code and all amendments and revisions to the code and all additions and supplements to the code. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Complaint: A written statement by the plaintiff stating the wrongs allegedly committed by the defendant.
• 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: includes the substantial weakening of structural or lateral support of an underground utility, penetration or destruction of any protective coating, housing or other protective device of an underground utility, the partial or complete severance of an underground utility and rendering any underground utility inaccessible. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Damage notice: means a notification made to the one-call service by a person who has caused damage to an underground facility. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Damages: Money paid by defendants to successful plaintiffs in civil cases to compensate the plaintiffs for their injuries.
• Defendant: means a person accused of an offense under this title and includes any person who aids or abets the commission of such offense. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• Defendant: In a civil suit, the person complained against; in a criminal case, the person accused of the crime.
• demolition: means any operation by which a structure or mass of material is wrecked, razed, rendered, moved or removed by means of any tools, equipment, or discharge of explosives. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Design locate request: means a communication to the one-call service in which a request for locating existing utility facilities for predesign or advance planning purposes is made. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Discovery: Lawyers' examination, before trial, of facts and documents in possession of the opponents to help the lawyers prepare for trial.
• Effective consent: means assent in fact, whether express or apparent, including assent by one legally authorized to act for another. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• 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.
• Ex officio: Literally, by virtue of one's office.
• Excavator: means any person who engages in activities described in subdivisions (A) and (B) in the definition of "excavate" contained in this section. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Executive committee: means the executive committee created by §. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• farm products: means forage and sod crops. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• 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.
• Force: means compulsion by the use of physical power or violence and shall be broadly construed to accomplish the purposes of this title. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• Government: means the state or any political subdivision of the state, and includes any branch or agency of the state, a county, municipality or other political subdivision. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• Harm: means anything reasonably regarded as loss, disadvantage or injury, including harm to another person in whose welfare the person affected is interested. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• Highway: includes public bridges and may be held equivalent to the words "county way" "county road" or "state road". See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Impending emergency: means circumstances potentially dangerous to life, health, property, the environment or the repair or restoration of service, which would likely develop into an emergency, as defined in §. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• 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.
• Knowing: means that a person acts knowingly with respect to the conduct or to circumstances surrounding the conduct when the person is aware of the nature of the conduct or that the circumstances exist. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• Law enforcement officer: means an officer, employee or agent of government who has a duty imposed by law to:
  (A) Maintain public order. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• Livestock: means all equine as well as animals which are being raised primarily for use as food or fiber for human utilization or consumption including, but not limited to, cattle, sheep, swine, goats, and poultry. See Tennessee Code 39-14-201
• Location: means the proposed area for which digging or excavating is scheduled within three (3) to ten (10) working days, such area not to exceed two thousand feet (2,000') in length unless an excavator and an operator or an operator's designated representative, such as a one-call service, agree to a larger area. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Mechanized equipment: means equipment operated by means of mechanical power including trenchers, bulldozers, power shovels, augers, backhoes, scrapers, drills, cable and pipe plows and other equipment used for plowing-in or pulling-in cable or pipe. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• nursery stock: means all trees, shrubs, or other plants, or parts of such trees, shrubs or other plants, grown or kept for, or capable of, propagation, distribution or sale on a commercial basis. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• 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.
• Occupied: means the condition of the lawful physical presence of any person at any time while the defendant is within the habitation or other building. See Tennessee Code 39-14-401
• One-Call Service: means a telephone notification service described in §. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Operator: means any person who owns or operates a utility. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Owner: means a person in lawful possession of property whether the possession is actual or constructive. See Tennessee Code 39-14-401
• Owner: means a person, other than the defendant, who has possession of or any interest other than a mortgage, deed of trust or security interest in property, even though that possession or interest is unlawful and without whose consent the defendant has no authority to exert control over the property. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• 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 the singular and the plural and means and includes any individual, firm, partnership, copartnership, association, corporation, governmental subdivision or agency, or other organization or other legal entity, or any agent or servant thereof. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• Person: means any individual. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Property: means anything of value, including, but not limited to, money, real estate, tangible or intangible personal property, including anything severed from land, library material, contract rights, choses-in-action, interests in or claims to wealth, credit, admission or transportation tickets, captured or domestic animals, food and drink, electric or other power. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• Property: includes both personal and real property. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Proposed area of excavation: means a general surface location which excavators are to furnish to operators of underground utilities or to a one-call service as defined in §. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Reckless: means that a person acts recklessly with respect to circumstances surrounding the conduct or the result of the conduct when the person is aware of, but consciously disregards a substantial and unjustifiable risk that the circumstances exist or the result will occur. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• Record: means information that is inscribed on a tangible medium or that is stored in an electronic or other medium and is retrievable in a perceivable form. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• 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.
• Representative: when applied to those who represent a decedent, includes executors and administrators, unless the context implies heirs and distributees. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Restitution: The court-ordered payment of money by the defendant to the victim for damages caused by the criminal action.
• Road: includes public bridges and may be held equivalent to the words "county way" "county road" or "state road". See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Serious bodily injury: means bodily injury that involves:
  (A) A substantial risk of death. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• Services: includes labor, skill, professional service, transportation, telephone, mail, gas, electricity, steam, water, cable television, entertainment subscription service or other public services, accommodations in hotels, restaurants or elsewhere, admissions to exhibitions, use of vehicles or other movable property, and any other activity or product considered in the ordinary course of business to be a service, regardless of whether it is listed in this subdivision (a)(38) or a specific statute exists covering the same or similar conduct. See Tennessee Code 39-11-106
• signed: includes a mark, the name being written near the mark and witnessed, or any other symbol or methodology executed or adopted by a party with intention to authenticate a writing or record, regardless of being witnessed. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• State: when applied to the different parts of the United States, includes the District of Columbia and the several territories of the United States. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• United States: includes the District of Columbia and the several territories of the United States. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Willful noncompliance: means the intentional refusal or failure to perform, or comply with, a duty created or imposed by this chapter or by rules promulgated pursuant to this chapter. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• Working day: means every day, except Saturday, Sunday, and national and legal state holidays. See Tennessee Code 65-31-102
• written: includes printing, typewriting, engraving, lithography, and any other mode of representing words and letters. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
• Year: means a calendar year, unless otherwise expressed. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105