Sacramento leaders asked National Basketball Association officials visiting Thursday to keep the Kings in Sacramento for at least another year while the region proves a new arena can be built – and an answer is expected May 2.

In a closed-door meeting at the state Capitol Thursday morning, Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg and other elected officials from the city and state asked the NBA to give the region a year to show they will be able to replace Power Balance Pavilion with a new home for the Kings.

Kings supporters also did their best to paint the town purple – waving purple-lettered signs outside City Hall, hanging Kings banners on buildings and dressing in the team's color. Oklahoma City Thunder owner Clay Bennett, who chairs the NBA Board of Governor's Relocation Committee, even wore a purple tie to the NBA meetings in Sacramento.

An NBA delegation led by Bennett and Harvey Benjamin, an attorney, met with about 20 people, including Sacramento City Council members and state officials, in Steinberg's office. NBA officials, who will also be here Friday, didn't indicate which way they're leaning.

"We haven't got a commitment yet," Mayor Kevin Johnson said in a press conference outside the U.S. Bank Building Thursday. "The quicker we get word that (the) team is here for another year – that is a big statement. I think that will happen no later than May 2, as I understand it today."

In a second NBA meeting Thursday – this time with business leaders at the U.S. Bank Building – Bennett and Benjamin asked if the region's corporate community is ready to "sign on the dotted line" to provide $9.2 million in financial support if the Kings remain in Sacramento another year, Johnson said.

"Clay Bennett wanted to make sure these were hard commitments," he said, adding that corporate leaders responded, "Yes."

Pledges were raised in the last two weeks during an effort spearheaded by Sacramento Metro Chamber President Matt Mahood and the mayor. Businesses and corporate leaders came "out of the woodwork" to pledge money – including owners of small and medium-size businesses whose smaller pledges haven't been tapped into yet, Mahood said during the press conference right after the meeting.

ICON Venue Group President Tim Romani and others from the ICON-Taylor development team later gave NBA officials an update on the financial feasibility study they're doing for a new arena.

No Kings rallies were held Thursday, said Kings blogger Blake Ellington, who founded the Here We Stay movement to keep the Kings in Sacramento.

But he and other supporters of the effort to keep the team wore plenty of purple. Members of the SEIU labor union waved signs saying workers support the Kings being here at the corner of 10th and I streets, outside City Hall.

Artist Anthony Padilla spray painted a large statue of a book in Natomas with the words "Here We Build" in purple.

Tim Ahmadzai, owner of the Hometown Favorites sports store at Sacramento International Airport's terminal A, decked out the front of his store with purple balloons and Kings paraphernalia to welcome the NBA to town.

Renee Viehmann of Rancho Cordova and her weimaraner, Roxie, both dressed in purple and stood outside the U.S. Bank Building where they hoped to catch a glimpse of NBA officials.

"I just wanted to come down and show the purple and hopefully show the NBA we don't want them to go," she said.

About 20 people who were out and about on J, K and L streets in downtown and Midtown late Thursday afternoon were spotted wearing purple. There weren't many people walking around the grid at that time, but some Kings fans expressed their loyalty through purple shirts, ties and Kings jerseys.

On Friday, 28-year-old Alex Kramers, a financial analyst in New York, said he will lead 10 to 20 Kings fans to NBA headquarters at 645 Fifth Ave. at 1 p.m. EDT. Dressed in purple, they will rally outside and drop off letters asking NBA Commissioner David Stern to keep the Kings in Sacramento.

Kramers has never lived in Sacramento. He became a Kings fan in the early 1990s watching Mitch Richmond play. He's been a "fan correspondent" writing on the Kings website this year.

He discovered other Kings fans also live in New York when he showed up outside last week's NBA meeting at the St. Regis Hotel. They decided to rally together this week, he said.

"We've got some passionate fans," Kramers said.

West Sacramento Mayor Christopher Cabaldon also said the meeting with the NBA went well.

"They were asking the right questions, and anytime they tuned in to the radio or turned on the TV or even went outside, they can't help but see the support for the team," he said as he stood inside Capitol Bowl in West Sacramento.

"They're here getting our business strategy.... We may not have our I's dotted and our T's crossed, but we know how to make this work, and they see that the whole region is coming together."

Bowling alley Manager Chris White said the Kings have always been part of this region and she will be sad if they go. Kings players have been loyal customers, she said.

"I bought size 16 and 17 (bowling) shoes because the Kings would come here and bowl," she said Thursday afternoon. "Mike Bibby and Bobby Jackson used to come here all the time and bring their friends and families."

But not everyone wore purple Thursday. Sacramento State student Jon Haas decided not to when he went into his internship at the Board of Equalization in the U.S. Bank Building Thursday.

"To be totally honest, I'd like the Kings to stay. But I'd like the Maloofs to go," he said, noting the Kings owners still owe the city millions of dollars. "It just seems like more trouble than it's worth."

After his morning meeting, Steinberg said NBA officials were "keeping their cards close to their chest" but he and others thought the meeting was very positive, said Steinberg spokeswoman Alicia Trost.

NBA officials are scheduled to do more fact-finding in town Friday, but no details were available.

Johnson and others appeared hopeful Thursday that the NBA wouldn't approve the Kings moving to Anaheim in early May.

"If we win today and if we get one more year, it's going to really boil down to our ability to build a new entertainment-sports complex," Johnson said. "People are going to want to know what's different. I think this is the beginning of hopefully something very positive going forward."

Staff reporters Brandon Darnell and Kathleen Haley contributed to this report. Suzanne Hurt is a staff writer for The Sacramento Press. Follow her on Twitter @SuzanneHurt.