The Harlan Municipal Utilities (HMU) was established in 1891 by public vote to provide electricity and safe, clean water to the City of Harlan. Natural Gas service was added in 1954. High speed Internet and cable TV were added in 1996 and telephone service in 2001.

HMU offers electric, gas, water and telecom services. Having all services under one roof makes it easier for customers to know who to call for outages, services and billing questions. It makes it easier to sign up for services and it makes it easier for billing.

During 2018, we entered the final phase of moving overhead electric distribution lines to underground. This multi-year initiative is designed to increase electric reliability by taking electric and telecom lines off of poles, where they are exposed to tree and storm damage, and placing them underground.

In conjunction with our overhead to underground conversion, we continued our fiber to the home (FTTH) project. Once the entire project is completed, every Harlan residence and business will have a dedicated fiber for sending and receiving high speed data.

In 2017, HMU received the Reliable Public Provider (RP3) designation from the American Public Power Association for the second time. The award is earned by electric utilities for reaching benchmarks of safety, reliability, system improvements and staff training.

HMU celebrated 125 years of service to Harlan in 2016.

In June of 2015, we launched a new cable TV line up with expanded HD networks and digital services. Also included in the launch was an increase of standard Internet speeds.

In April of 2014, the HMU Electric department earned our first Reliable Public Provider (RP3) designation from the American Public Power Association. The RP3 award is presented to public power utilities that demonstrate proficiency in four areas: reliability, safety, workforce development and system improvement.

In 2013, we built and began operating a new water plant. The old lime softening plant was taken off line and we began treating water with the reverse osmosis treatment.

We moved to our new offices at 2412 Southwest Ave on August 1, 2012. We also installed fiber to the home connections in part of Harlan.

HMU is, and will continue to be, Harlan's Premier Provider of electric, gas, water, cable TV, Internet and telephone service!