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.
Barneston is a village in Gage County, Nebraska, United States. The population was 122 at the 2000 census. The present-day town of Barneston was settled at the site of one of the largest Oto villages in the 1800s. The agency and a trading post were located there. Barneston was founded by a French fur traper who was married to an Oto woman.