Muni Fiber: Even Worse Than Muni Wi-Fi?

An interesting little tidbit: A small town in Minnesota is trying to borrow $25 million in bonds to install a fiber-optic network. But now a telco in the area, Bridgewater Telephone, is arguing that the bond issue may be illegal.

Regardless of whether muni fiber is or is not permitted by Minnesota law, it is a bad idea. It is sure to suffer from all the problems of muni wi-fi, such as (as I said in an earlier post) “the lack of need, large expenditures, tendency to lock-in old technologies, security risks, and sketchy public-private partnerships.”