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.
Swampscott is a town in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States located 12 miles up the coast from Boston in an area known as the North Shore. The population was 14,565 at the 2007 census. A former summer resort on Massachusetts Bay, Swampscott is today an affluent residential community which includes the village of Beach Bluff, as well as part of the neighborhood of Clifton. The town is home to Marian Court College. As of 2008 it was one of the top twenty wealthiest towns in Massachusetts.