Public utilities provide electric, gas, water or telephone service to customers in a specified area. Utilities have a duty to provide safe and adequate service on reasonable terms to anyone who lives within the service area on without discriminating between customers. Because most utilities operate in near monopolistic conditions, they can be heavily regulated by local, state, and federal authorities. Generally, the local and state agencies are called Public Service Commissions (PSC) or Public Utility Commissions (PUC). Municipal Utilities and Rural Electric Cooperatives may be unregulated though.
Vance is a town in Bibb and Tuscaloosa Counties in the U.S. state of Alabama, just outside of the city of Tuscaloosa. It is most famous for the Mercedes-Benz plant, currently the only one in North America. The current mayor of Vance is Keith Mahaffey. The Tuscaloosa County portion of Vance is part of the Tuscaloosa Metropolitan Statistical Area, while the Bibb County portion is part of the Birmingham–Hoover Metropolitan Statistical Area.