That only applies when the utility companies are heavily and well regulated. Take that away or loosen enforcement and you get things like California's campfire. Or in my own case, a large water company purchasing smaller water companies and immediately applying for higher prices... to cover the cost of purchasing more of the local water companies (transparently so).

Get a bunch of yes men on the board regulating a utility, though, and all the sudden it's easy for them to just approve whatever the utility wants to do regardless of public comment.