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.
Tieton is a town in Yakima County, Washington, United States. The population was 1,154 at the 2000 census. In recent years, Tieton has suffered economic depression, with the decline of its fruit warehouses. As of 2007, Seattle lawyer Michael Longyear and Ed Marquand, founding president of the art publishing house Marquand Books have been investing in the town and attempting to revive it, with a project they call project "Mighty Tieton."