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Trillium School at 5420 N. Interstate Ave. PHOTO COURTESY GOOGLE MAPS The Portland School Board will hold a public hearing Wednesday to move forward with the termination of the district’s contract with Trillium School, a kindergarten through high school public charter school, located at 5420 N. Interstate Ave. District staff cited dwindling academic performance and lack of financial viability at Trillium due to low enrollment for the past three years as reasons for the move, and the school board’s charter committee agreed. Trillum now faces having its charter terminated effective June 30, 2019, despite the school’s request to stay open. The hearing occurs Wednesday at 4 p.m. at the district’s headquarters at Blanchard Education Service Center at 501 N. Dixon St.

A tender story of their last conversation By Barbara Coombs Lee Oprah Winfrey’s mother, Vernita Lee, died last Thanksgiving Day, and Oprah recently shared with People Magazine the tender story of their last conversation. As usual, when Oprah shares a personal experience, her generous and insightful telling contains important lessons for us all in 2019. Barbara Coombs Lee These lessons are about mustering the courage to admit the life of a loved one is nearing its end. They’re about bringing that knowledge into the open and acting on it, so the things that need to be said, will be said. They’re about creating an opening for words to come that will ring in our ears forever, close a life story and heal our wounds. Two crucial decisions enabled Oprah and her mother to have one of the most meaningful conversations of their lives. The first was to decline aggressive, invasive treatment regimens as bodily functions deteriorated. Three years earlier, when Vernita’s kidneys began to fail, she put comfort and quality of life first, and declined dialysis. Recently, as other organs shut down, the family chose hospice care in the home. Without this decision, we might have heard quite a different story, of desperate medical interventions, physical suffering and emotional trauma. Researchers have found these are a recipe for complicated and prolonged grief, haunting loved ones with unfinished business, lingering regrets or unresolved conflict. So the first lesson here is that we’d best consider our specific end-of-life priorities before consenting to intensive medical treatments that usually diminish the quality of a waning life, but rarely prolong it. If Oprah had been visiting her mom in a hospital’s intensive care unit instead of a very warm, small room in her own home, if her mom were riding a conveyor belt of tests and treatments, technology and misery, there would have been little space for their blessed and beautiful goodbye. It probably wasn’t easy for Oprah and her mom to create the setting for a loving truth to emerge, as it rarely is. Our culture sends constant messages that we must treat death as an enemy to be conquered, deploy every medical technology in the battle and reject the possibility of “defeat.” It takes a lot of courage to resist incessant calls to battle. We need a new kind of heroism. We need more hero stories of people standing bravely, alert enough and informed enough to discern the perfect timing for surrender and retreat. Thank you, Oprah, for telling us this heroic story. Oprah’s second crucial decision came when she recognized the opportunity for sacred conversation was now, and delay would squander the opportunity. She had left her mother’s home, but felt compelled to return because their story was unfinished. Anyone who has lost someone close knows this truth: Just because a loved one dies does not mean our relationship with them ends. No, our bond will continue through all our days. But death does seal the story of that bond. The story can only grow and change while our loved one lives. Oprah tells of returning to her mother’s side, resolved to do what she could to craft a fitting farewell. She tells of patiently waiting hour after hour for the mood, the opening to appear. She becomes frustrated with the TV shows that preoccupy and distract her mother. On the second day of her intentional waiting, she turns to music, that it might break through to the deep places of the soul and dislodge the sacred words waiting to be spoken. Thankfully, the music accomplishes this goal. As Oprah’s story about her mother shows, it can take persistence and good timing to have sweet closure at the end. But only our words, and no one else’s words, can recall a shared life, celebrate its joys or put its painful memories to rest. May we all have the opportunity to follow Oprah’s wise and loving example to a blessedly strong finish. Barbara Coombs Lee, a former ER and ICU nurse and physician assistant, is the author of the new book Finish Strong: Putting Your Priorities First at Life’s End. She is President of Compassion & Choices, the nation’s oldest and largest organization working to empower everyone to chart their end-of-life journey.

The Portland Trail Blazers recognize six African American community leaders during pregame and halftime activities, Tuesday, Feb. 5, and presents them with limited edition game day posters designed by local artist Edmund Holmes. The honorees are (from left) Linfield College President Miles Davis, Meyer Memorial Trust President/CEO Michelle J. DePass, Portland City Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty, Portland Police Chief Danielle Outlaw, Oregon Supreme Court Justice Adrienne Nelson, and OHSU President Dr. Danny Jacobs. PHOTO BY ANTONIO HARRIS PHOTOGRAPHY Portland Trail Blazers spotlighted six leaders from the African American community in a Black History Month celebration during pregame and halftime activities Feb. 5 in a game against the Miami Heat at the Moda Center. The honorees, representing ground-breaking firsts as top leaders in their professional fields, were Portland Police Chief Danielle Outlaw; Oregon Health & Sciences University President Dr. Danny Jacobs; Linfield College President Dr. Miles Davis; Meyer Memorial Trust President and Chief Executive Officer Michelle J. DePass; Oregon Supreme Court Justice Adrienne Nelson and Portland City Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty. Each recipient received a limited edition Trail Blazers gameday poster designed by local artist Edmund Holmes. A portion of the event’s proceeds were donated to iUrbanTeen, a group whose mission is to expose and inspire underrepresented youth to become tomorrow’s business and technology leaders.

Undercutting discrimination protections By Marian Wright Edelman The U.S. Departments of Education and Justice in 2014 jointly released a ‘guidance package’ on school discipline to help schools and districts meet their responsibilities under federal civil rights law to use nondiscriminatory discipline practices. Years of data have shown children of color and children with disabilities are disproportionately punished by school discipline practices and suspended and expelled from school. Marian Wright Edelman Many schools and school districts have finally begun reforming their policies to promote positive academic and behavioral outcomes for all students and eliminate harsh and exclusionary discipline practices that push students out of school. During the Obama Administration the Departments of Education and Justice supported these positive reforms. Their 2014 guidance was a key step reminding schools of their legal obligations, followed by resources to help schools make sure they were providing equal opportunity for all students. The Trump Administration is now actively undercutting and eliminating this guidance. In December, just as most teachers and students were getting ready to leave for winter break, the Departments of Education and Justice announced they were rescinding the 2014 guidance reinforcing protections for students of color and students with disabilities from discrimination in school discipline. The Children’s Defense Fund joined the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and 119 other organizations last month in signing a letter to the Departments of Education and Justice urging them to immediately recommit “to vigorous enforcement of our civil rights laws and to a meaningful response to racial discrimination in school discipline.” The letter says the 2014 guidance “clarifies that [the Departments of Education and Justice] expect schools and districts to treat all children fairly and provides practical tools and guidelines for educators to create safe, healthy, and inclusive environments for all students … Rescinding the guidance sends the opposite message: that the departments do not care that schools are discriminating against children of color by disproportionately excluding them from school and that the departments will not fulfill their role in helping educators create and maintain safe schools that afford all students equal educational opportunities.” The letter also notes that rescinding the guidance is another in a long line of administration actions that “make schools less safe for LGBTQ students, sexual assault survivors, immigrant students, students of color, students with disabilities, and any child who experiences systemic discrimination.” Every day in America 2,363 children are arrested. That’s one child every 37 seconds. Thousands of children of color and with disabilities are getting trapped in the cradle to prison pipeline because of discriminatory school discipline policies that often push children into the juvenile justice system. We must continue to enforce the laws preventing discrimination, which remain intact, and the good practices referenced in the 2014 guidance and reject every effort to drag our nation’s laws and children backwards. As we enter Black History Month soon after celebrating what would have been Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s 90th birthday, his words inspire us to go forward and resist this administration’s attempts to push our children backwards. I often quote his clear words the first time I heard him speak in person during my senior year of college in Spelman College’s chapel: “If you cannot fly, drive; if you cannot drive, run; if you cannot run, walk; if you cannot walk, crawl. But keep moving. Keep moving forward.” We must not miss a step in our march toward justice. Marian Wright Edelman is founder and president emerita of the Children's Defense Fund.

Pulling back the curtain on unjust laws By Oscar H. Blayton It's time we stop lying to ourselves. The lying has gone on much too long and every time the lie is repeated, we are all the worse for it. Oscar H. Blayton The lie is that in America, everyone is equal under the law. It’s time to pull back the curtain on this lie, but in order to do so, first we must have an understanding of what "law" actually is. In its most basic form, law, is a process of authoritative control whereby certain members of a particular community establish and maintain a specific public order. This definition may seem like a mouthful, but history can help us unpack it. Nazi Germany had anti-Jewish laws, the racist regime of South Africa had apartheid laws and the southern states in this country had Jim Crow laws. The Nazis, the Afrikaners and the Southern segregationists all had authoritative control over their respective national and state communities. And with that control, they each ordered their societies in the manner they desired. In each of these instances, it is not difficult to identify those community members who sought to maintain a specific public order, nor is it difficult to identify the "specific order" they sought to maintain. For blacks in South Africa and the segregated southern United States, subjugation was the public order where they lived. And in the case of Jews living under Nazi control, it was extermination. For these people, those were the laws. A law need not be just or fair or benign to be the law. Law, like a gun or any other tool, can be used for good or for evil. To disguise the fact that laws can be cruel, unjust and designed to harm certain members of our community, "Blind Justice" was the myth created to foster the notion of a fair legal system in America. But observations in most American courtrooms will instruct us that what passes for justice in this country is not color-blind. Our laws are written with high-sounding words, full of dignity and sensibility but words are not deeds. And as in courtrooms, the long arm of the law, embodied in the form of law enforcement officers, reaches out into the streets and neighborhoods where we witness the double standards that are applied in enforcing our laws written in lofty language. Even though the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution ended slavery more than 150 years ago, people of color are still forced to wear the shackles that are the double standards in our country's legal system. Bigots and racists use our system of laws and law enforcement to police black and brown bodies, making it clear to people of color that we are neither welcome nor expected to exist in white spaces. Ohio maintains a specific public order that allows whites to walk the streets with automatic rifles unmolested by the police, but justifies gunning down a black man who is purchasing a BB rifle in an open carry state. And it finds no fault in a police officer executing a 12-year-old black boy for playing with a toy gun in a park. This is the law in Ohio. Many cities and states maintain a specific public order that targets people of color for fines and the confiscation of property in order to fund local and state governments. Ferguson, Mo. was proven to use the disproportionate levying of fines on people of color to fund their municipal activities. That was the law in Ferguson. The state of South Carolina’s civil forfeiture law allows police to confiscate money and property from people merely suspected of having committed a crime. This is often done without a trial, and in some instances, without even an arrest. Black men are subjected to this law at a rate vastly disproportionate to their numbers in the general population. A statewide journalism project in South Carolina titled “taken” reports that while comprising only 13 percent of that state's population, black men represent 65 percent of all citizens targeted for civil forfeiture. This is still the law in South Carolina. The slave codes, the Fugitive Slave Act, the Jim Crow laws of years past and the gutting of the Voting Rights Act just a few short years ago are all part of a process of authoritative control by certain community members to establish and maintain a specific public order that keeps people of color in shackles. There are many more laws that do this, but the list is too long to discuss in this short commentary. We must pull back the curtain to determine the true public order purpose of each law governing our lives and to identify those community members who seek to establish and maintain them. Once we do this, then we can ask ourselves, if this is the America we want for ourselves. And if not, what are we going to do about it? Oscar H. Blayton is a former Marine Corps combat pilot and human rights activist who practices law in Virginia.

We make progress by never giving up By Marian Wright Edelman When 26-year-old Stockton, Calif. councilmember Michael Tubbs was elected in 2016 as Stockton’s first black mayor, its youngest mayor ever, and the youngest mayor in U.S. history of a city with a population of at least 100,000, he had a mission to make positive change in his hometown. Last year the city made progress towards a key goal: reducing gun violence. Stockton police reported 40 percent fewer homicides and 31 percent fewer shootings between 2017 and 2018 and said increased police resources and community involvement are making a difference. Mayor Tubbs shared his thanks in a social media post: “The murder of my cousin is what brought me back to Stockton after college and I’ve spent the last six years as an elected official focused on reducing shootings and homicides and making our community safer…I want to thank Stockton Police Department, the Office of Violence Prevention and community partners like Friends Outside, Fathers & Families of San Joaquin and Advance Peace for the amazing work they did in 2018.” He added: “Let’s continue in 2019.” Stockton isn’t the only place making progress on gun violence. Across our nation, state leaders have responded to our children’s cries and advanced common sense gun violence prevention measures to keep them safe. Last year more than half of all states passed at least one gun violence prevention measure: Eleven states enacted laws to keep guns out of the hands of those convicted of domestic abuse; nine states banned bump stocks or strengthened existing bans; eight states and D.C. enacted extreme risk protection order laws which empower families and law enforcement officers to temporarily limit gun access for those who pose a danger to themselves or others; and seven states added new background check requirements or strengthened existing requirements. In total, 20 states and D.C. currently extend background checks beyond federal requirements. The majority of these laws were enacted in the months after the Parkland shooting—a testament to the courageous children and youths who organized and demanded leaders protect children, not guns. There have also been signs of positive progress at the federal level. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives issued a ban on bump stocks which will take effect on March 26 and remove these dangerous devices which can be attached to semiautomatic rifles to mimic machine guns. Bump stocks were used by the gunman who killed 58 people at a Las Vegas country music concert in 2017. The ban prohibits future sales of bump stocks and requires current bump stock owners to destroy the devices or turn them in. The midterm elections ushered a “gun sense” majority into Congress and established gun violence prevention as a national moral imperative and top legislative priority. Most notably, on Jan. 8 Congress introduced the bipartisan Background Checks Act which would require universal background checks for all gun sales, not just sales by licensed gun dealers, which is what current law requires. In the most recent Quinnipiac University poll, 92 percent of American voters supported these checks. This bill is a critical step towards keeping guns out of the hands of those who would use them to harm our children. While background checks don’t prevent legal gun purchases, they could prevent child and teen gun deaths. In 2017, 3,410 children and teens were killed with a gun. How many more senseless child and teen deaths will we allow before we enact common sense gun safety measures? While we are encouraged by these modest first steps, the fact that more preschoolers were killed by guns in 2017 than law enforcement officers in the line of duty reinforces that this is still an urgent crisis and we still have a long way to go. Every 2 hours and 48 minutes we fail to act, a child or teen is killed with a gun. We cannot afford to wait—our children’s lives are at stake. We must continue making progress and never give up. All of us must stand up and demand our elected officials pass the Background Checks Act with urgency and act to keep the momentum going. Every child and every person should be able to walk our nation’s streets without fear. With the anniversary of the tragedy in Parkland only a few weeks away let’s show our children they can finally count on us to protect them not guns. Marian Wright Edelman is founder and president emerita of the Children's Defense Fund.

A community market featuring a bevy of locally-owned black businesses, food, and live music kicked off a series of Black History Month events at Self Enhancement, Inc. Saturday, the nonprofit serving hundreds of local black families. Pictured are Bryan Walden (left), CEO of Black Mannequin clothing line, and Daunte Devon Paschal, the organizer of the Junction Avenue Black Owned Business Pop-up. PHOTO BY DANNY PETERSON The Center for Self Enhancement on 3920 N. Kerby Ave. has begun a series of free community events this month in honor of Black History Month. The kickoff was held Saturday when SEI hosted the Junction Avenue Black Owned Business Pop Up featuring and supporting a lineup of products and services offered by locally-owned Black businesses. This Friday, Feb. 7, the educational and family-resource nonprofit will welcome the community to hear special guest speaker Dr. Jason Okonofua give a talk on “Bias Impeding Academic Achievement,” presented by the community group Kúkátónón, which is from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. On Saturday, Feb. 9, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., SEI will host its 5th annual Community Day of Service. The film “The Hate U Give,” presented by Black Mental Health of Oregon, will screen on Friday Feb. 15 from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m.; and an African American women’s luncheon, We Are Overcomers, which has sold out, will take place Thursday, Feb. 28. For more information, visit selfenhancement.org.

Black America’s vanishing wealth is bad for all By Bob Lord Want an impossible task? Try identifying the most disturbing trend in America today. Consider the choices: Climate change denial, extreme political polarization, gun violence, etc. Those are just the ones on the national radar. Here’s one that isn’t, but needs to be: the systematic destruction of black wealth. The reality is horrific, according to the recent Institute for Policy Studies report Dreams Deferred. “Between 1983 and 2016, the median black family saw their wealth drop by more than half after adjusting for inflation,” the report notes, “compared to a 33 percent increase for the median white household.” Further, the report finds, “the median black family today owns $3,600 — just 2 percent of the $147,000 of wealth the median white family owns.” This affects you regardless of your color. Because inextricably connected to the widening racial wealth divide has been the extreme concentration of wealth at the very top. During the same three decades over which black wealth eroded, three of the wealthiest American families — the Koch, Walton, and Mars clans — increased their wealth by an astounding 6,000 percent. With the racial wealth gap dragging down America’s median wealth, that gives these billionaires ever greater say over what happens to the rest of us. Does the concentration of wealth at the very top also explain why the racial wealth gap existed in the first place? No — but two and a half centuries of slavery and another century of Jim Crow do. (Although those same immoral laws also created incredible family fortunes for plantation owners and others, whose descendants still benefit today from that accumulation of extreme wealth.) Concentration of wealth at the top doesn’t even explain fully the destruction of black wealth that’s occurred in recent decades. Structural and overt racism contributed as well. America’s policy of mass incarceration has hamstrung the ability of black Americans to reach parity with their white counterparts. Narrowing the racial wealth divide must necessarily involve not only de-concentrating wealth — the nearly exclusively white wealth — at the very top. It also must address a moral imperative that’s been neglected for too long: America must repay its centuries’ overdue debt to the descendants of enslaved Africans, the children and grandchildren of Jim Crow, and the victims of mass incarceration. Only one policy fits the bill: A reparations program. Wealthy Americans should pay the most, but nobody that’s benefitted from the discrimination should be exempt. Designing an effective reparations program will be tricky, to say the least. At a time when the country’s billionaires are systematically fleecing not just black Americans, but all Americans, reparations would have to lift black America in way that isn’t temporary. That will be a monumental challenge. But the challenge involved in designing a reparations program pales in comparison to the challenge that shouldn’t be a challenge at all: getting a critical mass of white Americans to recognize that the wrongs of the past have never been righted, that they’ve continued to this day, and that repaying America’s debt to black Americans cannot be ignored any longer. And before we even begin the challenge of persuading white Americans to do right, we first must persuade ourselves to stop doing wrong. Racism, structural and overt, is alive and well in America today. It’s time for decent Americans to recommit themselves to these challenges. If not now, when? Bob Lord is a Phoenix-based tax attorney and an associate fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies. Distributed by OtherWords.org.

2/5/2019, 3:59 p.m A community of youth and adult artists explore history through artistic expression in the annual theater production ‘Who I am; Celebrating Me.’ Portland'5 presents the 13th annual “Who I Am; Celebrating Me,” a community of youth and adult artists exploring black history through theater. From soul-encompassing singing and dancing to heartfelt poetry and prose, the production highlights a montage of African-American figures and movements of the good, bad, great, ugly past and present. Written and directed by Portland resident Shalanda Sims of World Stage Theatre, “Who I am’ Celebrating Me,’ will be performed on Sunday, Feb.10 at 3 p.m. at the Dolores Winningstad Theate, 1111 S.W. Broadway. Tickets are $10-$20.

By Dr. Karin Edwards There’s something about the turning of the new year that gives people a mind to make changes. The new year presents us with a blank slate, a chance to reinvent ourselves. People want to eat better, get into shape, spend more time with their families, do more of the things they love to do. All of these things are worthy goals, but why not aim for a fundamental change? Why not decide to make this the year that you find a great new career? The fact is, having a steady job with good pay and benefits – in other words, a career – leads to a more satisfying life with more self-determination. I’m not suggesting that money buys happiness, but a gainful job offers a person more choices: choices on where to live, what to do with your spare time, how you wish to raise your family, and much more. Today’s gainful employment, according to a recent Georgetown University study, can increasingly be found in “skilled service fields,” which include industries such as health care, finance, and information technology. In addition, as members of the Baby Boom generation transition into retirement, there is a rising demand for traditional skilled workers, like electricians, welders, and mechanics. For example, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, by 2024 our economy will need as many as 165,000 new trained electricians to meet marketplace demand. What these trends mean is that most living-wage jobs today require a significantly higher standard of technical training and education than in generations past. According to the Georgetown study, more than 95 percent of the jobs created during the recent economic recovery have gone to people “with at least some college education, while those with a high school diploma or less are being left behind.” What does this mean, then, to someone contemplating a change in career, or to a young person considering options for their future? It means it’s time to enroll in community college. Why community college, you might ask? For two reasons: First, not everybody is interested in earning a four-year degree, and there are lots of living-wage jobs out there that don’t require a four-year degree. Second, the price of a bachelor’s degree has increased exponentially over the past three decades. Community colleges remain the section of the higher-education system with the fewest barriers to entry. For many students, particularly low-income students and students of color, this can mean the difference between a bright future and not much future at all. Third, community college career and technical education programs maintain a very high standard of training and education, and remain in constant communication with private-sector to ensure that students are trained with the latest cutting-edge equipment, technology, and techniques to ensure that they’re ready to enter the workforce. Here’s just one example of what I’m talking about. Vigor Industrial Inc. operates a 60-acre facility on Portland’s Swan Island, where they build, repair, and refit ocean-going ships of all kinds. Through our partnership with Vigor, Portland Community College maintains a training facility at Vigor’s site where PCC Maritime Welding students can learn their trade on real ships alongside skilled industry veterans. These students are supported by faculty and staff at PCC’s nearby Swan Island Training Center, where people can also learn to become electricians, millwrights, industrial mechanics, and a range of other skilled trades. Newly-minted maritime welders can expect a starting wage of around $17 per hour to as much as $27 per hour, depending on the specifics of the job and the workplace. And these are jobs that are unlikely to be outsourced -- as long as the world needs ocean-going ships, it will need welders to work on them. What’s more, PCC is pursuing a federal designation of its Swan Island facility as a Maritime Center of Excellence, which would expand its capacity to train domestic maritime workers by admitting more students, expanding facilities, creating new maritime career pathways, and awarding credit for prior learning experience – including military service. These kinds of opportunities didn’t come to pass by accident. They’re part of a deliberate push by PCC to become our area’s premier job training and workforce development engine. In fact, at PCC, we call them “Pathways to Opportunity,” and they are spelled out under our president’s work plan. The Maritime Welding program is but one example of the many Pathways to Opportunity available through PCC. Whether you want to be an electrician, a medical assistant, a paralegal, a web designer, a medical lab technician, or any one of a wide range of gainful occupations, PCC could be the right fit for you. There is a path to a living-wage career, economic security, and a prosperous future – and it leads through community college. Dr. Karin Edwards is president of Portland Community College’s Cascade Campus.

Patriots score 13-3 victory Lawrence Guy of the New England Patriots kisses the NFL championship trophy after his team won the Super Bowl Sunday against the Los Angeles Rams, 13-3. (AP photo) (AP) — In a Super Bowl short on scoring, it was the New England Patriots’ defense that set the tone. The Patriots battered and bewildered quarterback Jared Goff and the Rams, stopping the NFL’s second-ranked scoring team en route to a 13-3 Super Bowl victory Sunday in Atlanta. “They played unbelievable,” New England quarterback Tom Brady said of the Patriots’ defense. The Rams’ 3 points equaled the fewest scored in a Super Bowl. When Goff began to find his groove late in the fourth quarter and the Rams trailing 10-3, Los Angeles drove inside New England’s 30 for just the second time in the game. But the momentum proved to be short-lived. Safety Duron Harmon combined with cornerback Stephon Gilmore to break up what would have been a touchdown pass to Brandin Cooks. Then, on the next play, Harmon pressured Goff on a blitz and forced him into a throw into coverage that was intercepted by Gilmore. New England’s offense took it from there, sealing the victory with a 9-play, 72-yard drive that ate up 3:05 and ended with a 41-yard field goal by Stephen Gostkowski.

Damian Lillard Portland Trail Blazers guard Damian Lillard was named an NBA Western Conference All-Star by a vote of NBA head coaches last week. Lillard is averaging 26.4 points, 4.6 rebounds, 6.3 assists and 1.08 steals for the season. An NBA All-Star in 2014, 2015 and 2018, he is only one of four players in Portland franchise history to become a four-time All-Star. The five starters from the Western Conference, decided by player, media and fan balloting, consist of Stephen Curry (Golden State), Kevin Durant (Golden State), Paul George (Oklahoma City), James Harden (Houston) and LeBron James (L.A. Lakers). Lillard will round out the reserves from the West, including LaMarcus Aldridge (San Antonio), Anthony Davis (New Orleans), Nikola Jokic (Denver), Klay Thompson (Golden State), Karl-Anthony Towns (Minnesota) and Russell Westbrook (Oklahoma City). The 2019 NBA All-Star Game will tip-off at 5 p.m. (Pacific) on Sunday, Feb. 17 in Charlotte, N.C. The game will air live on TNT.