I have always believed women have so many natural leadership qualities. They just need opportunities and access.

It's critical to be able to see things in other people that sometimes they don't see in themselves.

From a planning perspective, I thought Compton was phenomenal. It has a huge potential to be a great city, and I always bet on the underdog.

Gentrification is a problem of poor planning.

A leader's job is not to do the work for others, it's to help others figure out how to do it themselves, to get things done, and to succeed beyond what they thought possible.

Going to the Portland Trail Blazers, who actually took the time to invest in me, was perhaps the best thing that ever happened to me in my career. I got to a small market where I could focus on basketball, basketball, basketball. No distractions.

My biggest project right now is trying to be a really great mom and learning how to balance family and career. I'm just trying to spend as much time with my family as I can.

Looking back, I feel very fortunate to have had such a long career. Many skaters end their careers in their early 20s. I had the opportunity to go to two Olympic Games - almost three after being the alternate in 1994 and then in 2006 being injured.