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"&lt;p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt; Kevin Johnson's arena deal has been approved by Sacramento's City Council. (Rocky Widner/Getty Images)&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;By\u00A0Ben Golliver&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;By a 7-to-2 vote, Sacramento's City Council approved a deal struck between Mayor Kevin Johnson and developers to construct a new Downtown Plaza arena to house the Kings, who have been linked to a possible relocation to Seattle.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;The &lt;em&gt;Associated Press&lt;/em&gt; reports the terms of the deal, which was first announced by Johnson on Saturday.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;The Sacramento City Council voted 7-2 Tuesday to approve a deal that contributes $258 million to the $447 million project. The city plans to use money earned from leasing parking garages for events at the arena to help pay the public cost of the new arena on the current site of an aging shopping mall.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;The other $189 million will come from the California investment group seeking to have the NBA negate a pending sale that would move the team and restore the SuperSonics name.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;The approval was widely expected as the City Council voted to approve a different arena deal in 2012.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\"I\u2019m pleased to announce an agreement with [the] Burkle-Mastrov-Ranadive group on a public-private partnership to build a new [entertainment and sports complex] at [the] Downtown Plaza Mall,\" Johnson wrote on Twitter\u00A0on Saturday. \"Consistent with our core tenets, the deal avoids new taxes, protects the City on the Kings loan, and ensures no net impact to the general fund.\"&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Johnson added that the investment group -- which includes 24 Hour Fitness founder Mark Mastrov, billionaire Ron Burkle, TIBCO chairman Vivek Ranadive -- will \"make a 35-year commitment to keep the Sacramento Kings right here where they belong!\"\u00A0Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs has also joined the effort to keep the Kings in Sacramento.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;The agreement followed\u00A0Johnson's Feb. 28 State of the City address, which named Mastrov as the lead investor in an effort to purchase the Kings and Burkle as the head of the arena development effort. Ranadive, who is a part-owner of the Warriors, emerged last week\u00A0as additional muscle behind the ongoing efforts to prevent the Kings from relocating to Seattle.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;The &lt;em&gt;Sacramento Bee&lt;/em&gt;\u00A0noted\u00A0that the arena agreement, of course, is contingent \"on the Maloof family accepting a bid from the investment group to buy the Sacramento Kings.\"&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Back in January, the NBA announced that the Maloof family, who currently own the Kings,\u00A0reached a purchase and sale agreement\u00A0with a group of Seattle investors led by Valiant Capital's Chris Hansen and Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer for a controlling share of the franchise. The Seattle group then\u00A0filed the necessary relocation paperwork\u00A0with the league office in hopes that the Kings would move to Seattle for the 2013-14 season. Johnson and his partners have responded with extensive efforts to keep the Kings in Sacramento.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Roughly two weeks ago, NBA commissioner David Stern told reporters that the Sacramento's bid for the Kings would need to increase to merit consideration.\u00A0The Associated Press reported that Stern said that the Sacramento group has \u201Cvery strong financial people behind it but it is not quite there\u201D compared to the Seattle group. Stern added that there was a \u201Csubstantial variance\u201D between the two bids, noting that \u201Cunless it increases, it doesn\u2019t get to the state of consideration,\u201D and \u201Cright now it is fair to say that the offers are not comparable.\u201D&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Mastrov\u00A0told the\u00A0&lt;em&gt;Sacramento Bee&lt;/em&gt;\u00A0after Stern's comments\u00A0that he was not discouraged by Stern\u2019s statements.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CI didn\u2019t hear what the commissioner had to say, but we\u2019re excited about the Kings, we are going to be aggressive,\u201D he said. \u201CWe are aiming to win the bid, but it is a long process. We have a long way to go. We are going to continue to work with the NBA.\u201D&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;The NBA\u2019s Board of Governors will meet in New York City on April 18 and 19 to vote on the sale agreement between the Maloofs and the Seattle-group as well as the application for relocation. Johnson said he will be in attendance at the meetings to make his pitch.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CI\u2019ve been assured by the commissioner of the NBA that we will be given full consideration,\u201D Johnson said.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Stern\u00A0acknowledged during All-Star Weekend\u00A0in Houston that the Kings\u2019 saga would leave either Seattle or Sacramento empty-handed.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CI don\u2019t see any scenario in which both cities are happy here,\u201D Stern said, ruling out the possibility of expansion to\u00A0accommodate\u00A0both cities\u2019 desire to have a franchise.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Stern also said in Houston that it was \u201Cplausible\u201D that a Kings offer could win out over Seattle\u2019s agreement but cautioned against this turning into a bidding war, saying that the owners would have a \u201Cvery open mind\u201D as they weighed the two offers.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CI don\u2019t believe it\u2019s going to come down to economics,\u201D Stern said of the Board of Governors\u2019 consideration of two possible offers. \u201CI think the owners are going to have a tough issue to decide. \u2026 We don\u2019t have the predicate for that tough decision yet. It\u2019s going to wait upon Mayor Johnson making good on his statement that there will be an offer. And it\u2019s going to be upon the Sacramento area, a number of the regional municipalities and the various people who have been saying they\u2019ll give the mayor the support he needs.\u201D&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;The Seattle-area investment group\u2019s\u00A0plan is to play in KeyArena until a new stadium can be completed. The franchise would take on the SuperSonics moniker, starting a new chapter after the original team played in Seattle from\u00A01967-68 until 2008, when they were relocated to Oklahoma City and renamed the Thunder. The group\u2019s purchase and sale agreement includes a 65 percent share of the team at a $525 million franchise valuation.\nJohnson, Stern and the Maloofs reached an agreement on an arena deal for the Kings in February 2012 only to have the Maloofs back out two months later. In recent years, the Kings have also explored relocating to Anaheim and Virginia Beach. Kings fans recently held a \u201CHere We Buy\u201D\u00A0in an effort to express their interest in keeping the franchise, which relocated to Sacramento from Kansas City in 1985.&lt;/p&gt;"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.si.com/nba/point-forward/2013/03/27/sacramento-kings-seattle-supersonics-arena-deal-city-council-vote>