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.
Gallipolis is a chartered village in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Gallia County. The municipality is located in Southeast Ohio on the Ohio River. The population was 4,180 at the 2000 census, an 18% drop from the 1990 census level of 5,085. When the population dropped below 5,000, Gallipolis became a village, but continues to operate under its existing city charter. The accent goes on the last syllable when pronouncing the name: gal-li-pə-'lis or gal-li-pə-'lEs (rhyming with "police"), as opposed to the original French "ga-'lip-ə-lE", which has the accent on the second syllable. Gallipolis is the second-largest community in the Point Pleasant Micropolitan Statistical Area, which includes all of Gallia County, Ohio and Mason County, West Virginia.