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.
Clarkston is a city in DeKalb County, Georgia, United States. The population was 7,231 at the 2000 census. The city is home to the central campus of Georgia Perimeter College. The city is noted for its diversity. In the 1990s refugee resettlement programs identified Clarkston as a good fit for displaced persons of many different backgrounds. The rental market was open, residents were moving farther out from the Atlanta urban core, and Clarkston was the last stop on a transit line into the city. By the 2000s the local high school had students from more than 50 countries; a local mosque had 800 worshippers; and by some estimates, half the population was from outside the U.S.