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Carver County outlines CarverLink expansion, aims for countywide gig service
Summary
Carver County staff updated commissioners on the county-owned fiber network CarverLink, listing network capacity, recent security and infrastructure upgrades, partnership terms with MetroNet, and a two-phase build plan that seeks to complete rural gig access by June 2025 and city builds by June 2026.
Randy Lease, the county employee who manages CarverLink, told the Carver County Board of Commissioners that the county’s publicly owned fiber network has grown substantially and is on a timetable to offer countywide gig (1 gigabit symmetrical) availability.
Lease said CarverLink now includes approximately 1,200 miles of usable fiber and connects roughly 280 public-entity locations. He told the board the county operates a 50-gig backbone, of which about 30 gigabits are currently subscribed by more than 20 public entities, and that the network has about 3,200 interconnect points and five internet backbone feeds for redundancy.
The network’s origins trace to federal funding secured in 2011 and a 2013 launch. Lease described 2023–24 as “transformational”: the county added security systems, new firewalls, multi-factor authentication, a third data center, and operational changes he said make the network more resilient and easier to manage.
Lease reviewed two county construction efforts. The 2022 Connect Up Carver project was a roughly $10.5 million…
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