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.
Kimberly is an unincorporated community in Grant County, Oregon, United States. It is located at the intersection of Oregon Route 19 and Oregon Route 402 and the confluence of the John Day and the North Fork John Day rivers. Kimberly was named after the prominent local Kimberly family. Orin Kimberly established the first commercial orchard in the area in the 1930s. The James Cant Ranch Museum and the Thomas Condon Paleontology Center & Museum of the John Day Fossil Beds National Monument are located south of Kimberly on Route 19.