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.
Durant is a city in Cedar, Muscatine, and Scott counties in the U.S. state of Iowa. The population was 1,677 at the 2000 census. The community is named in honor of Thomas C. Durant, one of the pioneers of the Transcontinental Railroad and an individual who contributed the bulk of funds needed to build the town's first public school. The Scott County portion of Durant is part of the Davenport–Moline–Rock Island, IA-IL Metropolitan Statistical Area, while the Muscatine County portion of the city is part of the Muscatine Micropolitan Statistical Area.