A broadband bill being fast-tracked this week through the General Assembly led a candidate for state treasurer to opine that Colorado’s expectations about broadband may not be realistic.

During Thursday morning’s Senate debate on House Bill 1116, Republican Sen. Kevin Lundberg of Berthoud said the bill raises concerns between what most rural Coloradans want from high speed Internet and what’s more likely to happen.

Lundberg is among ten candidates for state treasurer in the fall, and one of three current Republican lawmakers seeking the post. He told the Senate that his district includes Estes Park, which is concerned about the lack of broadband availability. “This isn’t an automatic guarantee,” Lundberg said.

The bill is sponsored by the members of the Joint Budget Committee, which includes Lundberg. The measure would allow the state’s broadband deployment board to seek a waiver for a Federal Communications Commission auction that is slated to be held in the first quarter of 2018. The waiver, if accepted by the FCC, could allow the state to apply for a grant, possibly as much as $250 million, to expand rural broadband.

The bill passed the Senate Appropriations Committee early Thursday morning and won preliminary approval from the Senate later in the morning. A final vote is scheduled for Friday; lawmakers hope to have the measure on the governor’s desk by day’s end and signed before the end of the month.

The reasons for the rush to get the bill done, and get the broadband board working on the waiver, isn’t clear. Anthony Neal-Graves, head of the governor’s broadband office and a member of the deployment board, told Colorado Politics Wednesday that the state is unlikely to get the FCC waiver, as the commission has made it clear it no longer intends to grant them. The commission gave New York a waiver last year, but according to Sen. Kerry Donovan of Vail, that was to allow the state to apply for funds that would have gone to a New York broadband provider anyway.

Lundberg said the issue of broadband needs a note of caution. To anyone who thinks the state can guarantee everyone in Colorado access to high speed internet, “I’ve been here too long to believe in that scenario. I believe we can make good efforts, but five to ten years from now, technologies on the private side will eclipse our efforts.”

Lundberg is term-limited at the end of the year. He is running for state treasurer.