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.
Carson is a small unincorporated town in Skamania County in the southwestern part of the U.S. state of Washington. Carson is the population base of Skamania County, located just north of the Columbia River near the towns of Stevenson, Bingen and White Salmon in Washington and Cascade Locks and Hood River in Oregon and just south of Stabler, Washington. One major point of interest is the St. Martin's hot spring and resort, boasting a geothermal steam bath.