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TURN (The Utility Reform Network)
TURN (The Utility Reform Network) is a consumer advocacy organization headquartered in San Francisco, California. In 1972, Sylvia Siegel started TURN in her kitchen to represent consumers before the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), which she felt was overly focused on the interests of its regulated industries at the expense of consumers. Harry Reasoner interviewed Siegel about her work with TURN on CBS's 60 minutes in 1984. On January 1, 2008, Mark Toney became the executive director of TURN. Toney is a Brown University graduate, who later earned his Ph.D. in Sociology at UC Berkeley. Toney also founded DARE (Direct Action for Rights and Equality) to organize low-income families in Providence, Rhode Island in 1986. California Governor Jerry Brown appointed former TURN attorney Michael Florio to the California Public Utilities Commission in 2011. Following the San Bruno pipeline explosion, TURN filed a motion with the CPUC to "compel Pacific Gas and Electri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Non-profit Organization
A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in contrast with an entity that operates as a business aiming to generate a profit for its owners. A nonprofit is subject to the non-distribution constraint: any revenues that exceed expenses must be committed to the organization's purpose, not taken by private parties. An array of organizations are nonprofit, including some political organizations, schools, business associations, churches, social clubs, and consumer cooperatives. Nonprofit entities may seek approval from governments to be tax-exempt, and some may also qualify to receive tax-deductible contributions, but an entity may incorporate as a nonprofit entity without securing tax-exempt status. Key aspects of nonprofits are accountability, trustworthiness, honesty, and openness to ev ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Consumer Organization
Consumer organizations are advocacy groups that seek to protect people from corporate abuse like unsafe products, predatory lending, false advertising, astroturfing and pollution. Consumer Organizations may operate via protests, litigation, campaigning, or lobbying. They may engage in single-issue advocacy (e.g., the British Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA), which campaigned against keg beer and for cask ale) or they may set themselves up as more general consumer watchdogs, such as the Consumers' Association in the UK. One common means of providing consumers useful information is the independent comparative survey or test of products or services, involving different manufacturers or companies (e.g., '' Which?'', ''Consumer Reports'', etcetera). Another arena where consumer organizations have operated is food safety. The needs for campaigning in this area are less easy to reconcile with their traditional methods, since the scientific, dietary or medical evidence is normally ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of California cities by population, fourth most populous in California and List of United States cities by population, 17th most populous in the United States, with 815,201 residents as of 2021. It covers a land area of , at the end of the San Francisco Peninsula, making it the second most densely populated large U.S. city after New York City, and the County statistics of the United States, fifth most densely populated U.S. county, behind only four of the five New York City boroughs. Among the 91 U.S. cities proper with over 250,000 residents, San Francisco was ranked first by per capita income (at $160,749) and sixth by aggregate income as of 2021. Colloquial nicknames for San Francisco include ''SF'', ''San Fran'', ''The '', ''Frisco'', and '' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
California Public Utilities Commission
The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC or PUC) is a regulatory agency that regulates privately owned public utilities in the state of California, including electric power, telecommunications, natural gas and water companies. In addition, the CPUC regulates common carriers, including household goods movers, passenger transportation companies such as limousine services, and rail crossing safety. The CPUC has headquarters in the Civic Center district of San Francisco, and field offices in Los Angeles and Sacramento. History On April 1, 1878, the California Office of the Commissioner of Transportation was created. During the 19th century, public concerns over the unbridled power of the Southern Pacific Railroad grew to the point that a three-member Railroad Commission was established, primarily to approve transportation prices. However, the Southern Pacific quickly dominated this commission to its advantage, and public outrage re-ignited. As experience with public re ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harry Reasoner
Harry Truman Reasoner (April 17, 1923 – August 6, 1991) was an American journalist for CBS and ABC News, known for his adroit use of language as a television commentator, and as a founder of the long-running ''60 Minutes'' program. Over the course of his career, Reasoner won three Emmy Awards and a George Foster Peabody Award in 1967. Early life Reasoner was born on First Street North in Dakota City, Iowa; he and his older sister, Esther, were the children of Eunice (Nicholl) and Harry Ray Reasoner, who married in 1911. Reasoner was taught to read by his parents before entering school, gaining a broad vocabulary from his mother. Reasoner attended West High School in Minneapolis, where he developed an interest in journalism. He authored a story titled "The Wench of the Week," which garnered the attention of the principal, who expelled Reasoner, but later let him return following a plea from a fellow student. Reasoner graduated in January 1940, having missed the 1939 cla ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
60 Minutes
''60 Minutes'' is an American television news magazine broadcast on the CBS television network. Debuting in 1968, the program was created by Don Hewitt and Bill Leonard, who chose to set it apart from other news programs by using a unique style of reporter-centered investigation. In 2002, ''60 Minutes'' was ranked number six on '' TV Guide''s list of the " 50 Greatest TV Shows of All Time", and in 2013, it was ranked number 24 on the magazine's list of the "60 Best Series of All Time". ''The New York Times'' has called it "one of the most esteemed news magazines on American television". Originally airing in 1968, the program began as a bi-weekly television show hosted on CBS hosted by Mike Wallace and Harry Reasoner. The two sat on opposite sides of the cream-colored set, though the set's color was later changed to black, the color still used today. The show used a large stopwatch during transition periods and highlighted its topics through chroma key—both techniques are ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brown University
Brown University is a private research university in Providence, Rhode Island. Brown is the seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. Brown is one of nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution. Admissions at Brown is among the most selective in the United States. In 2022, the university reported a first year acceptance rate of 5%. It is a member of the Ivy League. Brown was the first college in the United States to codify in its charter that admission and instruction of students was to be equal regardless of their religious affiliation. The university is home to the oldest applied mathematics program in the United States, the oldest engineering program in the Ivy League, and the third-oldest medical program in New England. The university was one of the early doctoral-granting U.S. institutions in the late 19th century, adding ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
UC Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant university and the founding campus of the University of California system. Its fourteen colleges and schools offer over 350 degree programs and enroll some 31,800 undergraduate and 13,200 graduate students. Berkeley ranks among the world's top universities. A founding member of the Association of American Universities, Berkeley hosts many leading research institutes dedicated to science, engineering, and mathematics. The university founded and maintains close relationships with three United States Department of Energy National Laboratories, national laboratories at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore and Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Providence, Rhode Island
Providence is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island. One of the oldest cities in New England, it was founded in 1636 by Roger Williams, a Reformed Baptist theologian and religious exile from the Massachusetts Bay Colony. He named the area in honor of "God's merciful Providence" which he believed was responsible for revealing such a haven for him and his followers. The city developed as a busy port as it is situated at the mouth of the Providence River in Providence County, at the head of Narragansett Bay. Providence was one of the first cities in the country to industrialize and became noted for its textile manufacturing and subsequent machine tool, jewelry, and silverware industries. Today, the city of Providence is home to eight hospitals and List of colleges and universities in Rhode Island#Institutions, eight institutions of higher learning which have shifted the city's economy into service industries, though it still retains some manufacturin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jerry Brown
Edmund Gerald Brown Jr. (born April 7, 1938) is an American lawyer, author, and politician who served as the 34th and 39th governor of California from 1975 to 1983 and 2011 to 2019. A member of the Democratic Party, he was elected Secretary of State of California in 1970; Brown later served as Mayor of Oakland from 1999 to 2007 and Attorney General of California from 2007 to 2011. He was both the oldest and sixth-youngest governor of California due to the 28-year gap between his second and third terms. Upon completing his fourth term in office, Brown became the fourth longest-serving governor in U.S. history, serving 16 years and 5 days in office. Born in San Francisco, he is the son of Bernice Layne Brown and Pat Brown, who was the 32nd Governor of California (1959–1967). After graduating from the University of California, Berkeley and Yale University, he practiced law and began his political career as a member of the Los Angeles Community College District Board of Trustee ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
San Bruno Pipeline Explosion
The San Bruno pipeline explosion occurred at 6:11 pm PDT on September 9, 2010, in San Bruno, California, when a diameter steel natural gas pipeline owned by Pacific Gas & Electric exploded into flames in the Crestmoor residential neighborhood west of San Francisco International Airport near Skyline Boulevard and San Bruno Avenue. The loud roar and shaking led some residents of the area, first responders, and news media to initially believe that it was an earthquake or that a large airplane had crashed. It took crews nearly an hour to determine it was a gas pipeline explosion. As of September 29, 2010, the death toll was eight people. The United States Geological Survey registered the explosion and resulting shock wave as a magnitude 1.1 earthquake. Eyewitnesses reported the initial blast "shot a fireball more than in the air". Explosion and fire At 6:11 pm PDT on September 9, 2010, a huge explosion occurred in the Crestmoor residential neighborhood of San Brun ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pacific Gas And Electric Company
The Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) is an American investor-owned utility (IOU). The company is headquartered in the Pacific Gas & Electric Building, in San Francisco, California. PG&E provides natural gas and electricity to 5.2 million households in the northern two-thirds of California, from Bakersfield and northern Santa Barbara County, almost to the Oregon and Nevada state lines. Overseen by the California Public Utilities Commission, PG&E is the leading subsidiary of the holding company PG&E Corporation, which has a market capitalization of $3.242 billion as of January 16, 2019. PG&E was established on October 10, 1905 from the merger and consolidation of predecessor utility companies, and by 1984 was the United States' "largest electric utility business". PG&E is one of six regulated, investor-owned electric utilities (IOUs) in California; the other five are PacifiCorp, Southern California Edison, San Diego Gas & Electric, Bear Valley Electric, and Liber ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
