The public flare-up in the past week over whether the Kingsmust chip in for pre-development costs has thrown the city’s arena effort into doubt and exposed a fundamental problem: The two sides never were fully on the same page.

The rift puts into question whether the Maloofs will agree to the next step in the process, which calls for them to sign a tenant lease agreement by April 15 with AEG, the company the city plans to hire to operate the arena.

In further evidence that any tenuous trust has been broken, team attorneys filed a voluminous request two weeks ago with the city to view all memos, emails, letters and other documents exchanged between the city and the NBA in the last year, as well as communications between the city, AEG, the city’s arena consultants, other local governments and officials regarding the arena.

Their actions “once again (call) into question whether they’re really intent on making this work or whether they want to be a stumbling block,” (Sacramento political consultant Doug) Elmets said.

via Tony Bizjak and Ryan Lillis of The Sacramento Bee