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.
Zumbro Falls is a city in Wabasha County, Minnesota, United States, along the Zumbro River. The population was 177 at the 2000 census. The grist-mill dam built on Zumbro river in 1866 created the falls for which the town is named. The river is the cause of numerous floods which swept away the dam except for a few remaining traces of it. Also is home to Bluff Valley Campground The original settlement on the south side of the river dates back to 1857. Floods and tornadoes prompted the relocation of settlement to the north of the river. Relocated Zumbro Falls saw the arrival of railroad in 1881 and the city was incorporated in 1898.