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.
Zanesville is a city in and the county seat of Muskingum County, Ohio, United States. The population was 25,586 at the 2000 census. Zanesville was named after Ebenezer Zane, who had constructed Zane's Trace, a pioneer road through present-day Ohio. He settled in the area in 1797 with his son-in-law, John McIntire, at the point where Zane's Trace met the Muskingum River. From 1810-1812, the city was the second state capital of Ohio. The National Road runs through Zanesville as U.S. Route 40. Novelist Zane Grey, a descendant of the Zane family, was born in the city. The city has two engineering landmarks: the Muskingum River Parkway and its 160-year-old navigation system, designated a National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark; and the Zanesville Y-Bridge, the only such structure in the United States and listed on the National Register of Historic Places.