Sec. 16-345. Definitions. - Connecticut Statutes

      Sec. 16-345. Definitions. As used in this chapter:

      (a) "Person" means an individual, partnership, corporation, limited liability company or association, including a person engaged as a contractor by a public agency but excluding a public agency.

      (b) "Public agency" means the state or any political subdivision thereof, including any governmental agency.

      (c) "Public utility" means the owner or operator of underground facilities for furnishing electric, gas, telephone, telegraph, pipeline, sewage, water, community television antenna, steam or traffic signal service, including a municipal or other public owner or operator.

      (d) "Central clearinghouse" means the group of public utilities formed pursuant to section 16-348 for the purposes of receiving and giving notice of excavation activity within the state.

      (e) "Excavation" means an operation for the purposes of movement or removal of earth, rock or other materials in or on the ground, or otherwise disturbing the subsurface of the earth, by the use of powered or mechanized equipment, including but not limited to digging, blasting, auguring, back filling, test boring, drilling, pile driving, grading, plowing-in, hammering, pulling-in, trenching and tunneling; excluding the movement of earth by tools manipulated only by human or animal power and the tilling of soil for agricultural purposes.

      (f) "Demolition" means the wrecking, razing, rending, moving or removing of any structure.

      (g) "Damage" includes but is not limited to the substantial weakening of structural or lateral support of a utility line, penetration or destruction of any utility line protective coating, housing or other protective device or the severance, partial or complete, of any utility line.

      (h) "Approximate location of underground facilities" means a strip of land not more than three feet wide or a strip of land extending not more than one and one-half feet on either side of the underground facilities.

      (P.A. 77-350, S. 1; P.A. 95-79, S. 53, 189; P.A. 98-28, S. 103, 117; P.A. 99-31, S. 8.)

      History: P.A. 95-79 redefined "person" to include a limited liability company, effective May 31, 1995; P.A. 98-28 amended Subsec. (c) by changing electric service to electric distribution service, effective July 1, 1998; P.A. 99-31 redefined "public utility" to delete distribution facilities.

      Subdiv. (c):

      Cited. 12 CA 499.