Delano Municipal Code Ch. 5.08 Definitions

"Amusement ride" means a ferris wheel, scenic railway, merry-go-round, swing or similar device where a fee is charged for carrying a person thereon except in conjunction with some similar business already licensed in the city.

(Ord. 659 §1 (i), 1975).

"Auctioneer" means any person who sells goods by oral bids, for immediate sale and delivery, and does not include anyone who sells his own merchandise at his regular established and fixed place of business nor to livestock auctioneers who have complied with Act 196 of the General Laws of this state, nor to anyone selling merchandise belonging to the United States or to the state, under process of any state or federal court, or by bona fide sale of household goods at the domicile of the owner thereof.

(Ord. 659 §1 (j), 1975).

"Bankrupt sale" means the sale of merchandise which is bankrupt, assigned or damaged, not being sold by one having established place of business in the city, where the goods came from said business.

(Ord. 659 §1 (k), 1975).

"Business" is that which occupies the time, attention, or labor of men for the purpose of profit or livelihood, and it embraces all things necessary to be done to accomplish fully the purpose implied by the undertaking. "Business" includes professions, trades, and occupations and all and every kind of calling whether or not carried on for profit.

(Ord. 659 §1 (c), 1975).

"Business tax certificate" means the same as business license and shall be that document issued as evidence of payment of business taxes provided by this chapter and Chapter 5.04.

(Ord. 659 §1 (h), 1975).

"City" means the City of Delano, a municipal corporation of the State of California in its present incorporated form or in any later recognized, consolidated, enlarged or reincorporated form.

(Ord. 659 §1 (b), 1975).

"Collector" means the director of finance of the city and the duly authorized assistants and/or deputies thereof.

(Ord. 659 §1 (g), 1975).

"Common carrier" is a carrier of passengers, freight or express, not engaged in interstate commerce.

(Ord. 659 §1 (l), 1975).

"Contractor" means any person who is required to be licensed as a contractor by the State of California, or any person who undertakes to or offers to undertake to or purports to have the capacity to undertake to or submits a bid to or does himself or by or through others, construct, alter, repair, add to, subtract from, improve, move, wreck, or demolish any building, highway, road, railroad, excavation or other structure, project, development or improvement, or to do any part thereof, including the erection of scaffolding or other structures or works in connection therewith. The term contractor includes specialty contractor, and further includes any person who contracts to hire out trucks, tractors, excavating or other equipment, in connection with a construction project, whether at rates by the hour or day or for a contract amount.

(Ord. 659 §1 (m), 1975).

"Delivery service" means operating any motor vehicle for transportation of materials for compensation. If it is from a fixed place of business in the city to a point inside or outside the city, it is deemed as "local delivery." If not operating from a fixed place of business in the city, it is herein termed "outside delivery."

(Ord. 659 §1 (n), 1975).

"Fire or wreck sale" means sale of merchandise salvaged from a fire, wreck or other calamity, or advertised as such, occurring elsewhere than in this city.

(Ord. 659 §1 (o), 1975).

"Flea-market" or "swap-meet" means any collection of two or more vendors gathered together in a common area segregated by spaces, booths, or other designated selling locations for the purpose of selling, offering to sell, bartering or offer to barter, or any combination thereof, goods, wares, merchandise, or articles of value. This definition shall be liberally construed so as to apply to any activity commonly known and referred to as a flea-market or swap-meet.

(Ord. 841 (part), 1986).

"Flea-market, or swap-meet operator" means any person, corporation or organization conducting, managing or engaging in the business of operating a swap-meet or flea-market.

(Ord. 841 (part), 1986).

"Flea-market or swap-meet vendor" means any person, corporation or organization, and all employees and agents thereof, who purchases or acquires a space or spaces from a flea-market or swap-meet operator, or who purchases or acquires the right to be on the premises for the purpose of operating a business at a flea-market or swap-meet.

(Ord. 841 (part), 1986).

"Fortunetelling" means the business or art of astrology, palmistry, phrenology, lifereading, cartomancy, clairvoyance, clairaudience, crystalgazing, hypnotism, mediumship, prophesy, augury, devination, magic or necromancy, or telling of the future by any similar means, for a fee, demanded or received, directly or indirectly, as a gift, donation or charge, or the giving of an exhibition of any of the foregoing at a place where admission is charged. It does not include any religious ceremony or service when the person conducting holds a certificate of ordination as a medium, healer, clairvoyant or minister from any bona fide religious association having branches or churches in other communities as well as in this city, and a creed of principles, if all the compensation received goes solely to benefit the religious organization.

(Ord. 659 §1 (p), 1975).

"Gross receipts" includes the total of amounts actually received or receivable from sales and the total amounts actually received or receivable for the performance of any act or service, of whatever nature it may be, for which a charge is made or credit allowed, whether or not such act or service is done as a part of or in connection with the sale of materials, goods, wares or merchandise, included in "gross receipts" shall be all receipts, cash, credits, and property of any kind or nature, without any deduction therefrom on account of the cost of the property sold, the cost of materials used, labor or service costs, interest paid or payable, or losses or other expenses whatsoever. Excluded from "gross receipts" shall be the following:

A. Cash discounts allowed and taken on sales;

B. Credit allowed on property accepted as part of the purchase price and which property may later be sold;

C. Any tax required by law to be included in or added to the purchase price and collected from the consumer or purchaser;

D. Such part of the sale price of property returned by purchasers upon recision of the contract of sale as is refunded either in cash or by credit;

E. Amounts collected for others where the business is acting as an agent or trustee to the extent that such amounts are paid to those for whom collected, provided the agent or trustee has furnished the collector with the names and addresses of the others and the amounts paid to them;

F. That portion of the receipts of a general contractor which represents payments to subcontractors, provided that such subcontractors are taxed under this chapter and Chapter 5.04, and provided the general contractor furnishes the collector with the names and addresses of the subcontractors and the amounts paid each subcontractor;

G. Receipts of refundable deposits, except that refundable deposits forfeited and taken into income of the business shall not be excluded;

H. As to a real estate agent or broker, the sales price of real estate sold for the account of others except that portion which represents commission or other income to the agent or broker;

I. As to a retail gasoline dealer, a portion of his receipts from the sale of motor vehicle fuels equal to the motor vehicle fuel license tax imposed by and previously paid under the provisions of Part 2 of Division 2 of the Revenue and Taxation Code of the State of California;

J. As to a retail gasoline dealer, the special motor fuel tax imposed by Section 4041 of Title 26 of the United States Code if paid by the dealer or collected by him from the consumer or purchaser;

K. As to a telephone company, interstate toll revenues;

L. As to a public utility operating in the city under a franchise or franchises from the city and which makes franchise payments to the city, that portion of gross receipts used in calculating the franchise fees.

(Ord. 659 §1 (d), 1975).

"Hotel" means any business wherein furnished rooms are rented to the public, including motels and lodging houses, having more than five rentable rooms.

(Ord. 659 §1 (q), 1975).

"Itinerant vendor" or "itinerant merchant" means and includes all persons, both principal and agent, who engage in a temporary or transient business in the city, selling or offering to sell goods, wares or merchandise or any other thing of value, with the intention of conducting such business for a period of less than ninety days, and who for the purpose of such business, hires, leases or occupies any room, doorway, vacant lot, building or other place, for the exhibition for sale of goods, wares, merchandise or other thing of value. If any such place occupied or used for such business is rented or leased for a period of less than ninety days, such fact shall be presumptive evidence that the business carried on therein is a transient business; and any person so engaged shall not be relieved from the provisions of this section or from payment of the business taxes herein provided for such business by reason of any temporary association with a local dealer, trader, merchant or auctioneer.

(Ord. 659 §1 (r), 1975).

"Part-time occupation" means and includes any business with annualized gross receipts less than that amount established from time to time by the Social Security Administration which a person of age sixty-five years may earn without having his monthly social security benefits reduced.

(Ord. 659 §1 (s), 1975).

"Peddler" means any person who goes from house to house, place to place, or in or along the streets, within the city, selling or offering to sell, barter or exchange, and making or offering to make immediate delivery of any goods, wares, merchandise or anything of value, in the possession of the peddler, to persons other than manufacturers, wholesalers, jobbers or retailers of such commodities.

(Ord. 659 §1 (t), 1975).

"Person" includes all domestic and foreign corporations, associations, syndicates, joint stock corporations, partnerships of every kind, clubs, Massachusetts, business, or common law trusts, societies, and individuals transacting and carrying on any business in the city, other than as an employee.

(Ord. 659 §1 (a), 1975).

"Sale" includes the transfer, in any manner or by any means whatsoever, of title to property for a consideration; the serving, supplying or furnishing for a consideration of any property; and a transaction whereby the possession of property is transferred and the seller retains the title as security for the payment of the price shall likewise be deemed a sale. The foregoing definitions shall not be deemed to exclude any transaction which is or which, in effect, results in a sale within the contemplation of law.

(Ord. 659 §1 (e), 1975).

"Solicitor" means any person who for himself or any other person, firm or corporation, not having a fixed place of business within the city, engages in the business of going from house to house or from place to place in the city and/or by telephone or mail, selling or taking orders for, or offering to sell or take orders for goods, wares, or merchandise or any article for future delivery, or for services to be performed in the future, or for the making, manufacturing or repairing of any article or thing whatsoever for future delivery.

(Ord. 659 §1 (u), 1975).

"Sworn statement" means an affidavit sworn to before a person authorized to take oaths, or a declaration or certification made under penalty of perjury. For the purpose of this chapter and Chapter 5.04, the director of finance, his deputies, and/or duly authorized agents, are authorized to administer oaths.

(Ord. 659 §1 (f), 1975).