Dispute emerging between Kings and Sacramento over new arena agreement

[insidehoops]

Sacramento Bee:

Facing a major rift with the Sacramento Kings over funding the new downtown sports arena, city officials are postponing the expenditure of any city money until the dispute is solved.

The postponement would not stall the project, city officials said Friday. Instead, the city would be able to move forward with environmental reviews and other crucial pre-development tasks over the next two weeks, spending up to $200,000 advanced by the NBA on an emergency basis late Thursday.

The City Council is still expected to vote Tuesday whether to spend $6.5 million on the pre-development costs. But none of the money would be spent while the fight with the Kings persists.

The pre-development tasks were in danger of getting derailed when the Kings owners, the Maloofs, said this week they wouldn't put up $3.2 million for those costs.