As it looks more and more likely that the NBA season will be a complete washout, boosters of a new Sacramento arena are saying more loudly that it's about much more than the Kings.

Come on.

It's mostly about keeping the Kings in town. This current arena push is closely tied to the team almost decamping for Anaheim after 26 years in Sacramento. The city faces a March 1 deadline from the NBA to come up with an arena financing plan.

As part of the PR campaign that Sacramento needs and can support a new arena with or without the Kings, Mayor Kevin Johnson's regional arena committee hosted an event Thursday featuring Kay Barnes, the former mayor of Kansas City. She helped lead the effort to build the $276 million Sprint Center, which opened in 2007 and has succeeded despite not landing a major pro team.

That shows a new arena can work even if the Kings leave town, boosters say. They say the "Kansas City experience" also demonstrates that the investment in an arena can pay off in economic growth for Sacramento, particularly near the proposed arena site in the downtown railyard. The Think Big committee says that if a new arena spurred the same level of investment as in Kansas City, a place with similar demographics, it would mean a $2 billion net impact in Sacramento.

But that comparison is somewhat misleading.

As Barnes told The Bee's editorial board, Kansas City pursued the Sprint Center simultaneously with a new convention center, a new performing arts center and a new retail and entertainment district, so it's a stretch to credit the new arena for all that development. Also, while the Think Big report promotes the increase in tax revenues from the building boom in downtown Kansas City, it doesn't mention that the city has had to dip into its general fund because sales taxes in the entertainment district haven't covered the debt payments.

In other ways as well, the comparisons between Kansas City and Sacramento aren't quite airtight.

Sacramento is eagerly trying to get AEG, the entertainment conglomerate that gets much of the credit for the Sprint Center's success, to invest in and manage a new arena. AEG put up $53 million in exchange for control of the Sprint Center for 35 years. Under the deal, the city shares the operating profits if they're high enough. Since the arena opened, the city has received nearly $6 million in profit-sharing.

Most of that money, however, has gone to offset operating losses and pay off what the city still owes on Kemper Arena, which Sprint Center replaced, says Randy Landes, the finance director in Kansas City. And the profit sharing ends once the total hits the approximate $11 million construction cost overrun, he said.

In any case, the annual "profits" don't come close to the $14 million or so a year the city has to pay on the Sprint Center's 35-year construction bonds. That money comes from a $1.50 daily fee tacked on to hotel room bills and $3.50 per day charge on car rentals, plus $1.25 million a year in arena user fees passed on by AEG.

It's worth noting that in Kansas City – unlike the proposal in Sacramento – voters had their say, approving the hotel and car rental increases. Officials here don't plan to go to the ballot because the financing doesn't include a broad-based tax on residents.

There are no guarantees how much longer the Sprint Center can thrive without an NBA or NHL team as an anchor tenant. Barnes said Kansas City "would still love to have a franchise." She joked that before she was allowed to set foot in Sacramento, she had to promise not to try to bring the Kings back to Kansas City.

For a new arena's prospects, it's a huge advantage for Sacramento to already have a pro team. The Kings would be the primary user of a new arena, many of its amenities are designed to suit the NBA and the team is expected to help pay for it. It's disingenuous to pretend the team and new arena aren't intertwined.

The public certainly isn't fooled, so it only hurts arena boosters' credibility. If the financing deal moves forward, trust will be essential in reassuring taxpayers the city is making a wise investment.

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