Terms Used In Virginia Code > Title 32.1 > Chapter 6 - Environmental Health Services

• Aesthetic standards: means water quality standards which involve those physical, biological, and chemical properties of water that adversely affect the palatability and consumer acceptability of water through taste, odor, appearance, or chemical reaction. See Virginia Code 32.1-167
• 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.
• Alternative discharging sewage system: means any device or system which results in a point source discharge of treated sewage for which the Board may issue a permit authorizing construction and operation when such system is regulated by the State Water Control Board pursuant to a general Virginia Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit issued for an individual single family dwelling with flows less than or equal to 1,000 gallons per day. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• 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.
• Annuity: A periodic (usually annual) payment of a fixed sum of money for either the life of the recipient or for a fixed number of years. A series of payments under a contract from an insurance company, a trust company, or an individual. Annuity payments are made at regular intervals over a period of more than one full year.
• 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.
• Applicable regulations: includes regulations of the Board adopted pursuant to this article and occupational safety and health regulations applicable to migrant labor camps adopted by the Safety and Health Codes Board pursuant to Chapter 3 of Title 40. See Virginia Code 32.1-203
• 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
• 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.
• Base assessed value: means the assessed value of real estate within a development project area as shown upon the land book records of the local assessing officer on January 1 of the year preceding the effective date of the ordinance creating the development project area. See Virginia Code 58.1-3245
• Base assessed value: means the assessed value of real estate or machinery and tools within a local enterprise zone as shown upon the records of the local assessing officer on January 1 of the year preceding the effective date of the ordinance establishing the local enterprise zone development taxation. See Virginia Code 58.1-3245.6
• Bedding: means any mattress, mattress pad, box spring, upholstered bed, davenport, upholstered sofa bed, quilted pad, comforter, bolster, cushion, pillow, featherbed, sleeping bag, or any other bag, case or cover made of leather, textile or other material which is stuffed or filled in whole or in part with concealed substance, which can be used by any human being for sleeping or reclining purposes. See Virginia Code 32.1-212
• 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}
• Betterment loan: means a loan to be provided by private lenders either directly or through a state agency, authority or instrumentality or a locality or local or regional authority serving as a conduit lender, to repair, replace, or upgrade an onsite sewage system or an alternative discharging sewage system for the purpose of reducing threats to public health and ground and surface waters, which loan is secured by a lien with a priority equivalent to the priority of a lien securing an assessment for local improvements under § 15. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• Blighted area: means any area within the borders of a development project area which impairs economic values and tax revenues, causes an increase in and spread of disease and crime, and is a menace to the health, safety, morals and welfare of the citizens of the Commonwealth; or any area which endangers the public health, safety and welfare because commercial, industrial and residential structures are subject to dilapidation, deterioration, obsolescence, inadequate ventilation, inadequate public utilities and violations of minimum health and safety standards; or any area previously designated as a blighted area pursuant to § 36-48; or any area adjacent to or in the immediate vicinity thereof which may be improved or enhanced in value by the placement of a proposed highway construction project. See Virginia Code 58.1-3245
• Blighted property: means any property that endangers the public health or safety in its condition at the time of the filing of the petition for condemnation and is (i) a public nuisance or (ii) an individual commercial, industrial, or residential structure or improvement that is beyond repair or unfit for human occupancy or use. See Virginia Code 1-219.1
• Board of supervisors: means the governing body of a county. See Virginia Code 15.2-102
• camp: means one or more structures, buildings, tents, barracks, trailers, vehicles, converted buildings, and unconventional enclosures of living space, reasonably contiguous, together with the land appertaining thereto, established, operated or used as living quarters for one or more persons, one or more of whom is a migrant worker engaged in agricultural or fishing activities, including related food processing. See Virginia Code 32.1-203
• Camp operator: means a person who has charge, care or control of a migrant labor camp. See Virginia Code 32.1-203
• Chambers: A judge's office.
• 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.
• Chronically noncompliant waterworks: means a waterworks that is unable to provide pure water for any of the following reasons: (i) the waterworks' record of performance demonstrates that it can no longer be depended upon to furnish pure water to the persons served; (ii) the owner has inadequate technical, financial, or managerial capacity to furnish pure water to the persons served; (iii) the owner has failed to comply with an order issued by the Board or Commissioner pursuant to § 32. See Virginia Code 32.1-167
• Commercial establishment: means any commercial or industrial establishment, mill, factory, plant, refinery and any other works in which any chemical substance is manufactured or used as a raw material, catalyst, final product or process solvent for such; however, this term shall not be construed in the administration of this act to include normal farming and timbering activities. See Virginia Code 32.1-239
• Conduit lender: means a state agency, authority or instrumentality or a locality, local or regional authority or an instrumentality thereof serving as a conduit lender of betterment loans. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• Construction of wells: means acts necessary to construct wells, including the location of wells. See Virginia Code 32.1-176.3
• Continuance: Putting off of a hearing ot trial until a later time.
• Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
• Conventional onsite sewage system: means a treatment works consisting of one or more septic tanks with gravity, pumped, or siphoned conveyance to a gravity distributed subsurface drainfield. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• County: means any existing county or such unit hereafter created. See Virginia Code 15.2-102
• Courts of record: means the Supreme Court of Virginia, the Court of Appeals of Virginia, and the circuit courts. See Virginia Code 1-212
• Covered person: means any person set forth in the definition of "deceased person" in § 9. See Virginia Code 58.1-3219.13
• Current assessed value: means the annual assessed value of real estate in a development project area as recorded on the land book records of the local assessing officer. See Virginia Code 58.1-3245
• Current assessed value: means the annual assessed value of real estate or machinery and tools in a local enterprise zone as shown upon the records of the local assessing officer. See Virginia Code 58.1-3245.6
• Damages: Money paid by defendants to successful plaintiffs in civil cases to compensate the plaintiffs for their injuries.
• Decedent: A deceased person.
• 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.
• Department: means the State Department of Health. See Virginia Code 32.1-3
• Dependent: A person dependent for support upon another.
• Development project area: means any area designated for development or redevelopment, including any area designated for a dredging project other than a dredging project for or by the Virginia Port Authority, unless the Virginia Port Authority has an agreement with a local governing body for local financial participation in such a project, in an ordinance passed by the local governing body. See Virginia Code 58.1-3245
• Devise: To gift property by will.
• Docket: A log containing brief entries of court proceedings.
• En banc: In the bench or "full bench." Refers to court sessions with the entire membership of a court participating rather than the usual quorum. U.S. courts of appeals usually sit in panels of three judges, but may expand to a larger number in certain cases. They are then said to be sitting en banc.
• Enterprise zone: means an area designated by the Governor as an enterprise zone pursuant to Chapter 49 of Title 59. See Virginia Code 58.1-3245.6
• 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.
• Ex officio: Literally, by virtue of one's office.
• Ex officio: means service by virtue of one's office and includes voting privileges for ex officio members unless otherwise provided. See Virginia Code 1-215
• 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.
• farm: means any person that obtains at least 51 percent of its annual gross income from agricultural operations and produces the agricultural waste used as feedstock for the waste-to-energy technology, (ii) "agricultural waste" means biomass waste materials capable of decomposition that are produced from the raising of plants and animals during agricultural operations, including animal manures, bedding, plant stalks, hulls, and vegetable matter, and (iii) "waste-to-energy technology" means any technology, including but not limited to a methane digester, that converts agricultural waste into gas, steam, or heat that is used to generate electricity on-site. See Virginia Code 1-222.1
• Fee simple: Absolute title to property with no limitations or restrictions regarding the person who may inherit it.
• Fiduciary: A trustee, executor, or administrator.
• Filling material: means cotton, wool, feathers, kapok, down, plant or vegetable fibers, or any other material or substance or combination thereof, loose or in batting, pads, or any prefabricated form, that is used or that may be used in articles of bedding or upholstered furniture. See Virginia Code 32.1-212
• 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.
• 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}
• 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.
• 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
• Governing body: means the board of supervisors, council or other legislative body of any county, city or town. See Virginia Code 58.1-3245
• Governmental entity: means the Commonwealth, a town, city, county, service authority, sanitary district, or any other governmental body established under state law, including departments, divisions, boards, or commissions. See Virginia Code 32.1-167
• Human consumption: means drinking, food preparation, dishwashing, bathing, showering, hand washing, teeth brushing, and maintaining oral hygiene. See Virginia Code 32.1-167
• Importer: means any person who for the purpose of manufacture or resale receives bedding, upholstered furniture or filling material from any country other than the United States. See Virginia Code 32.1-212
• Includes: means includes, but not limited to. See Virginia Code 1-218
• Indemnification: In general, a collateral contract or assurance under which one person agrees to secure another person against either anticipated financial losses or potential adverse legal consequences. ^{Source: FDIC}
• inhabitants: means with reference to any county, city, town, political subdivision of the Commonwealth or any combination thereof, the natural persons in such county, city, town, political subdivision or combination as shown by the unadjusted United States decennial census last preceding the time at which any provision dependent upon population is being applied or the time as of which it is being construed. See Virginia Code 1-235
• Inter vivos: Transfer of property from one living person to another living person.
• Ionizing radiation: means gamma rays and X-rays, alpha and beta particles, high-speed electrons, neutrons, protons, and other nuclear particles. See Virginia Code 32.1-227
• Irrevocable trust: A trust arrangement that cannot be revoked, rescinded, or repealed by the grantor.
• 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}
• Licensed onsite soil evaluator: means a person who is licensed under Chapter 23 of Title 54. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• Lien: A claim against real or personal property in satisfaction of a debt.
• Life estate: A property interest limited in duration to the life of the individual holding the interest (life tenant).
• Litigation: A case, controversy, or lawsuit. Participants (plaintiffs and defendants) in lawsuits are called litigants.
• Local enterprise zone: means an enterprise zone designated as a local enterprise zone by an ordinance adopted pursuant to § 58. See Virginia Code 58.1-3245.6
• Locality: means a county, city, or town as the context may require. See Virginia Code 1-221
• Maintenance: includes pumping the tanks or cleaning the building sewer on a periodic basis. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• Manufacturing: means producing, formulating, packaging or diluting any substance for commercial sale or resale. See Virginia Code 32.1-239
• Migrant worker: means any individual from within or outside the Commonwealth who passes seasonally from one place to another for the purpose of employment, who is not a year-round employee and who occupies living quarters other than his permanent home during the period of such work. See Virginia Code 32.1-203
• 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.
• Mortgage loan: A loan made by a lender to a borrower for the financing of real property. ^{Source: OCC}
• New: means not previously used for any purpose. See Virginia Code 32.1-212
• 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.
• Obligations: means bonds, general obligation bonds and revenue bonds as defined in § 15. See Virginia Code 58.1-3245
• Open-end credit: A credit agreement (typically a credit card) that allows a customer to borrow against a preapproved credit line when purchasing goods and services. The borrower is only billed for the amount that is actually borrowed plus any interest due. (Also called a charge account or revolving credit.) ^{Source: OCC}
• Operate: means the act of making a decision on one's own volition (i) to place into or take out of service a unit process or unit processes or (ii) to make or cause adjustments in the operation of a unit process at a treatment works. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• Operation: means the biological, chemical, and mechanical processes of transforming sewage or wastewater to compounds or elements and water that no longer possess an adverse environmental or health impact. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• Operator: means any individual employed or contracted by any owner, who is licensed or certified under Chapter 23 of Title 54. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• Owner: means the Commonwealth or any of its political subdivisions, including sanitary districts, sanitation district commissions and authorities, any individual, any group of individuals acting individually or as a group, or any public or private institution, corporation, company, partnership, firm or association which owns or proposes to own a sewerage system or treatment works. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• Owner: means an individual, group of individuals, partnership, firm, association, institution, corporation, governmental entity, or the federal government, that supplies or proposes to supply water to any person within this Commonwealth from or by means of any waterworks. See Virginia Code 32.1-167
• Person: means an individual, corporation, partnership, or association or any other legal entity. See Virginia Code 32.1-3
• Person: means any individual, corporation, partnership, firm, association, trust, estate, public or private institution, group, department of the Commonwealth other than the Department of Health, political subdivision of the Commonwealth, any other state or political subdivision or department thereof, and any legal successor, representative, agent, or department of the foregoing, but not including federal government agencies. See Virginia Code 32.1-227
• Person: includes , in addition to the entities enumerated in § 32. See Virginia Code 32.1-239
• Personal property: All property that is not real property.
• Plaintiff: The person who files the complaint in a civil lawsuit.
• Private well: means any water well constructed for a person on land which is owned or leased by that person and is usually intended for household, ground water source heat pump, agricultural use, industrial use or other nonpublic water well. See Virginia Code 32.1-176.3
• Public facilities: means (i) airports, landing fields, and air navigation facilities; (ii) educational facilities; (iii) flood control, bank and shore protection, watershed protection, and dams; (iv) hospital facilities; (v) judicial and court facilities; (vi) correctional facilities, including jails and penitentiaries; (vii) library facilities; (viii) military installations; (ix) parks so designated by the Commonwealth or by the locality in its comprehensive plan; (x) properties of historical significance so designated by the Commonwealth; (xi) law enforcement, fire, emergency medical, and rescue facilities; (xii) sanitary sewer, water or stormwater facilities; (xiii) transportation facilities including highways, roads, streets, and bridges, traffic signals, related easements and rights-of-way, mass transit, ports, and any components of federal, state, or local transportation facilities; (xiv) waste management facilities for hazardous, radioactive, or other waste; (xv) office facilities occupied by a public corporation; and (xvi) such other facilities that are necessary to the construction, maintenance, or operation of a public facility as listed in clauses (i) through (xv) and directly related thereto. See Virginia Code 1-219.1
• Public gathering places: includes , but is not limited to:

  (a) Historic shrines;

  (b) Terminals of public transportation companies;

  (c) Festivals, fairs, races and other places where 100 or more people congregate at one time. See Virginia Code 32.1-198

• Public law: A public bill or joint resolution that has passed both chambers and been enacted into law. Public laws have general applicability nationwide.
• Pure water: means water fit for human consumption that is (i) sanitary and normally free of minerals, organic substances, and toxic agents in excess of reasonable amounts and (ii) adequate in quantity and quality for the minimum health requirements of the persons served. See Virginia Code 32.1-167
• Quorum: The number of legislators that must be present to do business.
• Radioactive material: means any material that emits ionizing radiation spontaneously. See Virginia Code 32.1-227
• 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}
• Regulations: means the Sewage Handling and Disposal Regulations, heretofore or hereafter enacted or adopted by the State Board of Health. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• 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.
• Remand: When an appellate court sends a case back to a lower court for further proceedings.
• reproduction: shall be deemed to include photographs, microphotographs, microfilm, microcard, printouts, optical imaging or other reproductions of electronically stored data, or any other reproduction of an original from a process which forms a durable medium for its recording, storing, and reproducing. See Virginia Code 58.1-106
• Review Board: means the State Sewage Handling and Disposal Appeals Review Board. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• Secondhand: means having been made prior use of or containing any filling material of which prior use has been made. See Virginia Code 32.1-212
• 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.
• Sewage: means water-carried and non-water-carried human excrement, kitchen, laundry, shower, bath or lavatory wastes, separately or together with such underground, surface, storm and other water and liquid industrial wastes as may be present from residences, buildings, vehicles, industrial establishments or other places. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• Sewerage system: means pipelines or conduits, pumping stations and force mains and all other construction, devices and appliances appurtenant thereto, used for the collection and conveyance of sewage to a treatment works or point of ultimate disposal. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• Shoddy: means any material which has been spun into yarn, knit or woven into fabric and subsequently cut up, torn up, broken or ground up. See Virginia Code 32.1-212
• Site plan: means a sketch of a parcel of land, showing the property boundaries, the proposed site of the water well, and any potential sources of contamination. See Virginia Code 32.1-176.3
• Source material: means uranium or thorium, or any combination thereof, in any physical or chemical form; or ores that contain by weight one-twentieth of one percent (0. See Virginia Code 32.1-227
• Special nuclear material: means (i) plutonium, uranium 233, uranium enriched in the isotope 233 or in the isotope 235, and any other material which the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission or any successor thereto has determined to be such but does not include source material; or (ii) any material artificially enriched by any of the foregoing but not including source material. See Virginia Code 32.1-227
• Special order: means an administrative order issued to any person to comply with: (i) the provisions of any law administered by the Board, (ii) any condition of a permit, (iii) any regulation of the Board, or (iv) any case decision, as defined in § 2. See Virginia Code 32.1-167
• 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 Board: means the State Board of Health. See Virginia Code 32.1-3
• Subsurface drainfield: means a system installed within the soil and designed to accommodate treated sewage from a treatment works. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• Supervisor: means a member of the board of supervisors of a county. See Virginia Code 15.2-102
• survey plat: means the schematic representation of a parcel of land, showing the property boundaries, the proposed site of the water well, and any potential sources of contamination, prepared by an individual licensed by the Commonwealth to perform such services. See Virginia Code 32.1-176.3
• Tax increment: means the amount by which the current assessed value of real estate exceeds the base assessed value. See Virginia Code 58.1-3245
• Taxpayer: includes every person, corporation, partnership, organization, trust or estate subject to taxation under the laws of this Commonwealth, or under the ordinances, resolutions or orders of any county, city, town or other political subdivision of this Commonwealth. See Virginia Code 58.1-1
• Testimony: Evidence presented orally by witnesses during trials or before grand juries.
• 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.
• 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
• Transportation: means the vehicular conveyance of sewage. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• Treatment works: means any device or system used in the storage, treatment, disposal or reclamation of sewage or combinations of sewage and industrial wastes, including but not limited to pumping, power and other equipment and appurtenances, septic tanks, and any works, including land, that are or will be (i) an integral part of the treatment process or (ii) used for ultimate disposal of residues or effluents resulting from such treatment. See Virginia Code 32.1-163
• 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.
• Trustor: The person who makes or creates a trust. Also known as the grantor or settlor.
• 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}
• Upholstered furniture: means any article of furniture designed to be used for sitting, resting, or reclining that is wholly or partly stuffed or filled with any filling material. See Virginia Code 32.1-212
• Water supply: means water taken into a waterworks from wells, streams, springs, lakes, and other bodies of surface water, natural or impounded, and the tributaries thereto, and all impounded ground water but does not include any water above the point of intake of such waterworks. See Virginia Code 32.1-167
• Waterworks: includes all structures, equipment, and appurtenances used in the storage, collection, purification, treatment, and distribution of pure water except the piping and fixtures inside the building where such water is delivered. See Virginia Code 32.1-167
• Writ: A formal written command, issued from the court, requiring the performance of a specific act.