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.
Campbell is a city in Santa Clara County, California, a suburb of San Jose part of Silicon Valley, in the San Francisco Bay Area. As of 2007 population estimates, Campbell's population is 39,200. Although not a major high-tech city like many of its neighbors, Campbell is the original home of eBay and of its creator, Pierre Omidyar. Campbell is home to the Pruneyard Shopping Center, a sprawling open-air retail complex which was involved in a famous U.S. Supreme Court case that established the extent of the right to free speech in California. The larger of the associated Pruneyard Towers, built in 1970, was for many years the tallest building between San Francisco and Los Angeles. Today the Pruneyard Shopping Center is home to Democrat Mike Honda and the south bay offices of the FBI.