
Tulsa Remote - Aloha
https://tulsaremote.com/#hero
======
chrissnell
I'm saddened by all of the negativity in these comments. So many people
falling back on the old stereotypes of the South and Midwest, people who have
clearly not spent time in these places. I live in a small city in Kansas and
have worked remotely for SFBA tech companies for over 10 years. I moved here
from the Seattle area. I can tell you that life is amazing when you make Bay
Area money and live in a small Midwestern city. You can build a beautiful, new
house with lots of space and spend far less than rent on a SF 1 bedroom
apartment. You can walk to work--drivers are friendly out here--at a coworking
facility (we have two in my little town alone) and eat lunch for less than $10
no problemo. You can find almost anything you need locally and if you can't
find it here, you'll have plenty of spare cash to book a five-star hotel room
in the big city for the weekend and go shopping.

People are super friendly and contrary to what so many of you mistakenly
believe, not judgmental. Gay couples live openly and happpily here. I've never
met a racist or seen anything racist; indeed, nearly half of the houses on my
block here in the affluent side of town are either black or mixed-race
families. Kids play in the streets together every day and they can walk to the
bus stop without the parents worrying about an Uber driver running them over.

I hope that someone here takes Kaiser/Tulsa up on their offer and reports
back. I think you will be pleasantly surprised.

~~~
komali2
It's gotta be judged city to city. Charleston, south Carolina is chock full of
straight Jim crow racism, and I'd hazard to say that's the majority there.

It's not fair to apply that stereotype to Tulsa without going there and
checking it out, but I think it's a reasonable concern.

------
Twirrim
Admittedly this is aggregate for the whole state:

[https://www.usnews.com/news/best-
states/oklahoma](https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/oklahoma)

    
    
      Overall Rank Out of 50: #43
      Health Care #48
      Education #39
      Economy #36
      Opportunity #38
      Infrastructure #31
      Crime & Corrections #34
      Fiscal Stability #22
      Quality of Life #17
    

Those aren't great incentives for people with families to want to move. Might
be more tolerable for younger folks?

Of course, getting fresh tax revenue etc may be important towards getting
those various things improved, and Tulsa might be significantly better than
the rest of the state.

~~~
nwatson
But where are they ranked in BBQ? I moved to North Carolina from SF Bay Area
and NC has much going for it ... but North Carolinians think NC BBQ is like
top-3 (Lexington style, Eastern style, etc.) -- but I don't see it. I much
prefer Louisiana or Texas BBQ. I'll say other aspects balance out the mediocre
NC BBQ.

If Oklahoma / Tulsa BBQ is in the top-3 that might make up for a few of the
deficits.

~~~
skrebbel
I don't understand, isn't a BBQ a device you put in your garden? How can it
differ per state?

(not sarcastic, I'm just a clueless foreigner)

~~~
jdhn
You're thinking of a grill, which is used to make the BBQ. As for how it
differs from state, I think it's the recipes for the BBQ that differ (some
places use vinegar, others use ketchup).

~~~
skrebbel
But it's about the habits in people's backyards right? Or about restaurants?

~~~
javagram
Pretty sure they are comparing BBQ restaurants which are definitely a thing,
and differ in style from state to state.

As you’ve implied, if you’re cooking the meat yourself in your backyard then
you can do any style you want. I believe “true bbq” can be considered more
time consuming than just throwing meat on a grill, and would involve the use
of a smoker and perhaps other equipment. It’s not just grilling meat.

------
Finbarr
This reminds me a lot of patio11’s fascinating write up about Japanese
Hometown Tax. It makes total sense for small cities to pay for high earning
remote workers to move there. Perhaps this will become a trend.
[https://www.kalzumeus.com/2018/10/19/japanese-hometown-
tax/](https://www.kalzumeus.com/2018/10/19/japanese-hometown-tax/)

~~~
skrebbel
It's related to hometown tax how? Because both have descriptions that include
the words "town" and "money"?

~~~
Finbarr
Because it could create a situation where small cities and counties are
competing against each other to win the favor of workers. It’s not an
identical situation, and arguably this competition already exists, but it’s
much more obvious when direct cash incentives are being offered.

------
S_A_P
Spent 6 months on a project in Tulsa. I’m a big fan of the place. I was in the
downtown area and ended up staying in the Mayo hotel most weeks. The
incredible thing was that I was in a ~1500 square foot apartment style 2
bedroom with full kitchen and was paying on average 129/night. These rooms
were 5-600 a night on weekends but the place was a ghost town during the work
week. It was right next to the blue dome and bands like Pearl Jam, rob zombie,
Katy perry all stayed in the place while I was there. Downtown becomes a ghost
town at 5pm but there is a decent night life as well. I would totally live
there.

------
joeax
I've been working remote for 7 years, more recently as a software developer
consultant. I showed this to my wife about two hours ago and she got really
excited. Neither of us like where we are living now, and have been eyeing a
relocation to Texas, notably Austin or possibly Dallas. But this is definitely
worth a look, based on what we've seen so far.

I'm curious if others in the tech crowd are considering the same. If you are
please post your story. It would be encouraging to see other interested this
offer. Heck we could be neighbors.

~~~
yardie
Just got back from Austin and Dallas. Your options are going to be a lot
deeper in both of them. And if you have a family, nothing in OK, sounds very
encouraging on the education front.

~~~
joeax
I don't disagree, as I've been to both places in the past year scoping it out.
But what has me intrigued about Tulsa is how far they are going to improve the
area.

Let's assume this experiment works, and they draw 200 high-wage tech and
creative class workers to the area. Over time, a community forms, startups are
launched, and investments are drawn to the area. Quality of life improves, and
it draws more of these workers and there's a sort of multiplier effect that
transforms the area.

IMO Dallas and/or Austin would be a no-brainer but the cost of living has shot
up dramatically in the past few years. But in the end, I guess you get what
you pay for.

------
Bjorkbat
[https://www.cnbc.com/2018/09/21/7-us-cities-that-will-pay-
yo...](https://www.cnbc.com/2018/09/21/7-us-cities-that-will-pay-you-
thousands-of-dollars-to-live-there.html)

Financial relocation incentives don't appear to be anything new, but the
alternatives never seemed to ring any bells for me. Hard to pin down
precisely, but I think part of it was the fact that a lot of them were asking
you to settle down in what might as well be the frontier in terms of urban
density and amenities, or maybe the city in question was a burnt-out husk of
its former self (a different kind of frontier almost), or maybe the incentive
wasn't so much cash as much as loan assistance or some other thing that
doesn't sound as sexy.

Looking at the website, pretty obvious that they're not asking me to settle in
a small town or a burnt-out husk of a city. Despite my biases against
Oklahoma, I get the sense that this is a pretty exciting place to be. On top
of that, the incentives actually seem very practical. It's cash, plain and
simple.

I like it, if you couldn't already tell.

~~~
knightswhosayni
I live in Tulsa now. Don't do it.

Just because this website says it is exciting doesn't mean it is. They are
throwing money at the issue of a brain drain and lagging economy.

Tons of people who "went to school in Tulsa" don't live there now because it
is the opposite of exciting.

~~~
pstuart
Thought experiment: you are now Mayor of Tulsa and have received a $100M grant
to "make Tulsa exciting". Assume the situation is that whatever you propose
would not be opposed.

What would you do?

~~~
knightswhosayni
Allow new business to be created without the city's red tape and dismantle the
old-boys club that drove away innovation for a century.

~~~
poulsbohemian
> dismantle the old-boys club

How?

~~~
knightswhosayni
> Allow new businesses to be created without the city's red tape

Mostly

------
ethagknight
I mean WOW the comments here are snotty against Tulsa. Relatively little
discussion of the incentive itself, the fact that a single private individual
is paying for the incentive (!!), or other dynamics of relocation to cheaper,
easier towns for remote work.

I visited Tulsa a few months ago to just check it out. I enjoyed it greatly.
The Tulsa Gathering Place is absolutely unreal for a free public park. There
is enough going on there to make it a worthwhile place to move to for a few
years. A considerable amount of very high end architecture and art there.

I am doing a multifamily development with similar (not nearly as generous)
relocation incentives tied in through a medical district. Very interesting way
to move the needle and encourage shifts in living. For most cities, this is a
much cheaper way to approach affordable housing as well.

~~~
Cambridge_Man
I grew up in Tulsa as a minority. Went to Jenks Public schools.

Two students in my graduation class got accepted to Harvard, and others to
MIT, U Penn, and Duke. They have gone on to become successful tech
entrepreneurs and professors. The graduating class after my year had 4
students accepted to Stanford.

Non est ratio ad gustum ... Über Geschmack lässt sich nicht streiten ... Les
goûts et les couleurs ne se discutent pas ...

There is a reason why almost every language has an idiomatic expression to
express the same idea.

Tulsa may be a great place for you, it may be a not so great place for you.
But dismissing an idea based on no real experience and innate prejudices is
pretty stupid.

~~~
tfandango
Hey there, another Jenks graduate here. I'm currently more towards the OKC
area but definitely would love to live in Tulsa again. It's a laid back kind
of place, great cost of living, plenty to do... Not for everyone I'm sure but
perfect for me.

I think the state of education in our state is a pretty big problem, but there
are nationally ranked high quality schools like you said, Jenks, Union,
Norman.

~~~
lester1986
[https://www.tulsaworld.com/news/local/oklahoma-senior-
from-j...](https://www.tulsaworld.com/news/local/oklahoma-senior-from-jenks-
accepted-at-all-eight-ivy-
league/article_2dba31cc-c6bf-5920-ad7e-a55c5a615f7c.html)

[https://www.tulsaworld.com/goodnews/how-i-got-here-how-
sarah...](https://www.tulsaworld.com/goodnews/how-i-got-here-how-sarah-
cameron-was-accepted-to/article_7fe84dca-09dd-5fc9-a815-46e6225b3ea4.html)

Oklahoma senior from Jenks High School accepted to all 8 Ivy League schools

Sarah Cameron boasts a long list of extracurricular activities, including
academic clubs and an impressive tennis career. Now she can brag about her
eight college acceptance letters, all to Ivy League schools.

------
DoreenMichele
I don't qualify for this offer, and I wouldn't accept it if I did. I have a
ragweed allergy. I was horribly ill when I lived in Kansas, probably at least
in part because it is ragweed central. Oklahoma is also ragweed central. So
that doesn't work for me.

I liked Oklahoma when I went through there. I spent a few years kind of
wishing I could live in Oklahoma. I am a homebody who spends a lot of time
online. I need a few decent places to eat and shop, but I can kind of make my
own fun.

I mostly don't understand complaints that a city is "boring." I mean, if it
has 500 people, okay, I can see that. I need a certain amount of city fabric.
But I don't really get it when that gets said about big cities. Tulsa is 400k
people.

------
prestonbriggs
I have a sister who recently bought a house in Tulsa. Their house is so large
it's got rooms she's forgotten about... Pretty new, pool, nice neighborhood.
Cost less than $300K. I don't know about the school district (Jenks). I'd sure
like to see some progressive voters move down there.

~~~
byproxy
>I'd sure like to see some progressive voters move down there.

Related to this, I wonder what the born&raised locals would think of this
incentive. (gentrification?)

~~~
prestonbriggs
There's a lot of oil money in Tulsa, has been for decades. I'm not sure
they'll notice.

------
dougmwne
Both Oklahoma and Vermont have close to a 5% state income tax on the first
100k of income, so for many on HN, this is more like a rebate on state income
taxes over the first 2 years. I guess if you always dreamed of moving to these
places this could be that little nudge to finally try it out.

~~~
xvedejas
This means that states without income tax (WA, NV, TX, TN etc) are yet still
more enticing for most high-earning professionals. I agree with other
commenters saying this doesn't do much except help the people who always were
considering moving to OK/VT.

~~~
DareRight
I've never understood this thinking. A state has a certain amount of
expenditures in their budget. They have to acquire those funds somehow. If
they don't collect income tax, they bump up food tax, or hotel tax, or
restaurant tax, or diesel tax, etc. The money is coming out of your wallet one
way or the other.

~~~
yardie
I live in a state without income tax and moderately high property taxes. This
arrangement tends to favor the rich, inheritance owners over the working
class. In a state income tax state, my taxes are dependent on me working, and
a smaller percentage goes to property.

In a property tax state, my taxes are entirely dependent on the property
market, regardless of how much or little I make. When there is a budget
shortfall the bureaucrats juice the millage rate. Property re-assessments go
up, rarely down. And if you owned property for a long while you pay less in
taxes than someone younger and on a lower salary.

~~~
j4kp07
> This arrangement tends to favor the rich...

What a complete and utter lie. What hole are you pulling these "facts" from?

> And if you owned property for a long while you pay less in taxes than
> someone younger and on a lower salary.

You mean, someone retired and unemployed vs. someone at the peak of their
career?

Man...you are projecting so hard, it's palpable.

~~~
matt4077
> What a complete and utter lie.

Don't accuse others of lying when even a modicum of good faith points to them
simply holding opinions different from yours.

In this case, they are also right. At least under the assumption of taxation
linear to property value.

Thats because richer people tend to spend less (as a %) of their income on
housing. I hope that's intuitively obvious: making minimum wage, you're likely
to spend 40% or 50% of income on rent. At the other extreme, the Bill Gates of
the world spend about a Pentium III rounding error of their income.

It's the same with every other consumption taxes. Often, the first $100,000 in
value or so are free. That helps a little, but only for the balance between
the poor and the middle class. It's almost impossible to adequately tax the
super-rich within this framework.

------
rmason
I predict this is going to start a trend. For a whole lot less than the
$48,000 a job municipalities paid to attract Amazon why not spend a fifth of
that and draw in thousands of remote workers?

~~~
Matthias247
As long as there is not also a trend at companies to offer more remote jobs
that unfortunately won't help too much.

I would appreciate it if both things become a trend.

------
soared
Similar initiative from Vermont:

[https://qz.com/work/1289727/vermont-will-pay-you-10000-to-
mo...](https://qz.com/work/1289727/vermont-will-pay-you-10000-to-move-there-
and-work-remotely/)

~~~
OhSoHumble
I looked into moving to Vermont but the main problem was that there was an
extreme lack of housing. The cities in Vermont are incredibly small and have
very little in the way of new developments. I tried trawling Craigslist but I
just couldn't find many attractive places to live.

~~~
lj3
Keep in mind that Craigslist may not be the best way to find an apartment.
From what I've seen, smaller cities don't tend to use online services for
things like apartment hunting. Things are still done the old way: word of
mouth, posting signs on the apartment itself, newspaper classifieds.

~~~
mcovey
This is very true. I had a fantastic apartment that I got by walking in and
asking about availability. They always seem to have something available within
a few months, but don't advertise at all, anywhere. Yet remain at near-100%
occupancy.

Actually the only ad they really have is a "now leasing" sign with a phone
number near the entrance.

------
ken
Remote workers already know they can live anywhere, and $10K is nice but for a
professional software engineer it's not _that_ great. So while I'm not looking
to move, I'm curious what they're using to entice me to want to live there.

What I see is ... a whole lot of drinking-related activities. "Experience"
Oktoberfest, "Toast" at lots of bars, "Hang Out" at lots of other bars, "Brew"
more beer. I wonder if this is more a reflection of what's in Tulsa, or who
their target audience is.

~~~
ajcodez
I think it's target audience. If you're in late 20's early 30's and single it
hints at a vibrant social life that could lead to a relationship. It's
probably easier to move your single self than transition to a long distance
relationship or move your whole family. The cash incentive too of $10k goes a
lot further in your 20's.

~~~
nmca
I wonder if they thought that explicitly.

------
dgllghr
Is Oklahoma still refusing to fund their schools so they can stay open 5 days
a week?

~~~
pilom
Colorado is doing this too because tax increases go to referendum votes and we
can't convince people to actually pay for school funding.

------
nodesocket
> $10,000 cash.

One thing to note, the state income tax rate in Tulsa is 4.44%, so if your
business makes $100,000 a year in profit, expect to pay around $4,500 in state
taxes. I live in the great state of Tennessee with zero state income tax, and
I'd much rather be in Nashville than Tulsa.

~~~
itomato
Plus Nashville is surrounded by Tennessee and hundreds of musicians and music
lovers. Tulsa is surrounded by Oklahoma.

------
magd
Tulsa native here. Don't do it unless you want to be surrounded by religious
nut jobs.

~~~
atomical
Check out any news article posted here on obesity and health. It's full of
smart people that have embraced psuedoscience.

------
ummonk
I was in Oklahoma for several years of my childhood. Would not recommend for
anyone who isn’t a white Christian. Granted, I was in Stillwater, but OKC and
Tulsa are only a little better.

------
irl_zebra
This is very cool, great website too. I actually looked up Tulsa while reading
this. Well done. When I search Tulsa in Google maps the default street view is
a desert looking place though. I wonder if they could affect that.

------
durkie
you'd be real close to one of tulsa's best features:
[https://www.youtube.com/svseeker](https://www.youtube.com/svseeker) \--
dude's building a giant scientific research boat in his front yard and will
host just about anyone that wants to help him work on it. i've been out there
twice and it's awesome!

------
mrfusion
Why not offer incentives to employers to create remote jobs? That’s really
where the bottleneck is.

~~~
SteveNuts
They don't necessarily want more remote workers, they want to attract workers
that already have out-of-state jobs so they can collect the easy income tax
and income from you living there.

------
scythe
Tulsa's geographic upside is the nearby Ouachita Mountains. There's hiking,
climbing and caving, moreso than in nearby cities like Dallas or Wichita.

The downside is five snowy days per year and eleven above 100 Fahrenheit, and
occasional cases of scary spinning sky triangles. This rules it out for me.

~~~
chasd00
Oklahoma is ground zero for crazy severe weather. I think they turn the
tornado sirens on at the start of spring and just leave them on until about
mid summer.

------
chpmrc
[https://www.numbeo.com/crime/in/Tulsa](https://www.numbeo.com/crime/in/Tulsa)

Yeah...No.

~~~
Twirrim
That's self-reported data, rather than anything officially sourced.

~~~
chpmrc
Which is arguably more reliable than "official" data.

~~~
Twirrim
26 data points is utterly useless as a representative sample.

Even if it wasn't, people tend to overestimate crime.

------
jgelsey
If Tulsa would just abandon its racism and religious bigotry I bet they'd
attract a lot more folks than this offer will.

------
burtonator
I'd love to have some Amazon-style incentives for my remote company to build
an "office" in Tulsa.

I've been thinking of a hybrid remote work environment where we just have lots
of remote workers that live near each other and can co-work say 2-3x per week
- meetup for coffee or have mini hackathons say 1-2x per quarter.

------
danimal88
Its interesting - given the 48k/job incentive that was being talked about for
the amazon hq2, I wonder how the 10K in Oklahoma incentives compares. Of
course, one is a corporate incentive in a place where a lot of skilled workers
would likely be either way, and one is a place trying to attract talent, but
on some level, it makes me wonder if the outrage over the tax incentives
actually makes sense. Given the state income tax revenues and local economy
inputs, it would seem that a 10K RAC (Resident Acquisition Cost) for someone
making > 50K would be a no brainer assuming they still in Oklahoma for 4 years
and the tax obligation is 5% to the state. Not sure what the numbers would
look like in NY instead and whether the opportunity cost really applies since
it would likely be full of ppl either way.

------
whalesalad
Yeah but then you’re living in Tulsa...

If the housing assistance wasn’t tied to a specific apartment complex I’d
seriously consider it though.

Just relocated back to my home state of California and my wife and I are
already planning to leave when the lease is up.

------
viraptor
I'm a bit confused by the city/town split. I'd definitely describe Tulsa as a
city, but then again I'm coming from a 150k people city and living in a 20k
people town at the moment. The website seems to use them interchangeably, and
I remember an article some time ago describing Austin as a "town" people move
to.

What are the thresholds in the US before people start saying something's a
city?

~~~
itronitron
IMHO, a town has one main street with the majority of businesses on that
street. Don't believe any of the bullshit you read about Austin, it's not a
town now and it wasn't a town even back in the 1970's.

------
axaxs
Posted on the sister thread...

I think this is a really smart move, but not enough. Most remote employees,
well, the ones they want to attract, make good money. 10k frankly isn't much,
especially to uproot and move. Tulsa isn't really near anything, nor does it
have a fallback job market. Speaking for myself, maybe 30k or a free small
house could convince me, not 10k and a possibly discounted apartment...

~~~
scruple
Yeah. The $10k is essentially a relocation package for anyone with a family
and a house. Clearly those folks are not the target audience, sadly.

------
gre
For this to work, you have to live in Tulsa.

------
andy_ppp
What I’ve never understood- what prevents me from, as a remorlte worker
setting up a business in a tax haven and charging through that... I mean if
this loophole is available to extremely well off individuals and companies why
not for services...

~~~
lifeformed
I think they usually tax by where you do business (which is usually where you
live, for remote work), not where it's incorporated.

------
dcow
Random thought: why doesn’t the DNC use all their money to fund voter
relocation programs? Surely the surplus of California and New York voters
could move the needle if they were injected into smaller districts across the
board.

~~~
xfitm3
I can’t articulate how your comment makes me feel, but please no.

~~~
dcow
I’m not advocating for it, I’m earnestly asking why they don’t.

------
surfmike
Funny enough, the residents of my SF peninsula town (San Carlos, but most
others have the same attitude) have had enough of people moving here and want
the flow to stop.

Glad to see this initiative by Tulsa.

------
jaredhansen
It seems like every dozen threads or so in the last year have at least one
thread with bizarrely cantankerous / dismissive replies, with a few lonely
voices saying _when did you all get so unhappy?_

Tulsa's initiative here is _really, really good_. It doesn't matter if you
want to live in Tulsa, specifically (fine! don't move!), and it doesn't matter
if the incentive is high enough to make it Worth It to You Personally.

What matters is that somebody has figured out that the dynamics of the Amazon
HQ2 bidding war (roundly critiqued elsewhere, but I'll leave that for another
thread) _apply to individual remote workers as well_ \--- in other words,
potentially to basically everyone reading HN.

Quit whining, and start celebrating. Get this in front of your own city. Show
them that there's an opportunity. It has never been a better time to be in
software.

~~~
webkike
I’m not sure about everyone else, but I can point to a very specific date as
to when we all became unhappy

~~~
obiefernandez
November of last year.

~~~
rednerrus
Y'all were pretty miserable before that.

------
NoblePublius
No direct flights from SF or NYC :(

------
Rafuino
Hmm I wonder if I'd be eligible for this after having left Oklahoma post high
school...

------
fmajid
Still way cheaper than what New York and Virginia are paying for HQ2

------
abalone
I wonder if it would be useful to start including political culture in these
comparisons. They tend to focus on cost of housing and “quality of life”
metrics like the existence of third wave coffee and cocktail bars. And yet,
clearly, there’s more to decisions than that. So many people who are queer,
minority, or allies, disgusted by Trump and those who vote for him, may deeply
resent living in hostile environments. I’m not saying this as a political
statement but genuinely trying to highlight a major factor in deciding where
to relocate.

I can cite many anecdotes of folks who have tried living in different
environments and fled due to (lack of) diversity and the political culture.
These pitches and comparative analyses should give it due consideration.

~~~
lj3
> I can cite many anecdotes of folks who have tried living in different
> environments and fled due to (lack of) diversity and the political culture.

The opposite is far more common. White Flight is not just the name of my Bee
Gees cover band.

------
monocasa
Ironically, Tulsa had a chance to be a thriving business center around the
turn of the century. Unfortunately, the business owners were the wrong skin
color as Tulsa was known as The Black Wall Street.

In 1921, a white mob killed hundreds, and white police officers flew planes
firebombing 35 blocks, in the first use of air bombing in anger on American
soil.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_race_riot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_race_riot)

Part of me is happy to see that they're so desperate for business that they're
pulling this.

~~~
dionian
What city do you live in and do you judge them by what they did 100 years ago?
Not sure why that is relevant.

~~~
hrktb
Are you arguing that the people from that event 100 years ago either all had a
change of heart and raised their kids in respect of other humans, or massively
left Tulsa for whatever reason, despite their attachment to the town ?

Because short of that, 100 years is roughly two or three generations, and
that’s a short time to change the cultural composition of a town’s wealthy
layer.

~~~
bennettfeely
By extension do you judge and dismiss everyone living in Germany today with
the same rationale?

~~~
hrktb
A lot of things happened to Germany, from the outside, from the inside, a lot
of the people who participated died from the war or in the aftermath, people
who survived went through a lot, be it through direct trials or post-war
education to children overwatched by the surrounding countries.

It's in my opinion one of the very few example of a recovery after such
events.

I came across the "Black wall street" event of Tusla a while ago, and in
comparison I don't get the impression that anything was really done to in
reparation or even to change the course of things, almost the opposite.

To not be too personal about how shitty I feel it is, from the wikipedia:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_race_riot#Aftermath](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_race_riot#Aftermath)

> In the end, no one was convicted of charges for the deaths, injuries or
> property damage.

> A group of influential white developers persuaded the city to pass a fire
> ordinance that would have prohibited many blacks from rebuilding in
> Greenwood.

> No prosecution took place of any whites for actions committed during the
> riot. The city settled into an uneasy peace, and decades of virtual silence
> about the events began. It was not recognized in the Tulsa Tribune feature
> of "Fifteen Years Ago Today" or "Twenty-five Years Ago Today".

To address the "people living today are innocent" part, it's not a matter of
being part of the crime or not, but wether the Tusla culture is tainted by its
past or not. And to have a culture change, there needs to be recognition,
reflection and rejection of past issues, with a strong will to compensate and
overcome. Is there any of that?

From the outside, I'd wager Oklahoma wouldn't still have an active branch of
the KKK if there was such a dramatic shift.

------
claydavisss
This is very forward-thinking. Props to whoever came up with this.

------
sureaboutthis
Interestingly enough, the topic of tonight's CBS TV show, "Young Sheldon", was
this very topic of moving to Tulsa for work.

At least it's an interesting coincidence to me. Not that I ever watch TV or
anything.

------
Animats
They sound desperate.

Why would you move from one place to another place to be a remote worker for a
third place? This would make more sense if there were businesses in Tulsa
which needed more workers.

~~~
Forge36
Tulsa wants your tax income. If Tulsa can make it attractive, and a person's
cost of living is reduced some people may take them up on the offer. Since
many remote works choose where to live, a paid opportunity to move could be an
ideal situation.

Tulsa has made an offer, that you aren't interested does not mean Tulsa is
desperate.

~~~
thatcloudguy
But in actual fact, they are desperate. Property values are dropping, they
can't attract people to live there because it's an exceptionally boring place
to live.

~~~
sethhochberg
I have worked full-time remote for almost my entire career, yet I've ended up
in big cities exclusively (aside from a couple of few-month stints in a far-
flung place every now and then). Why?

\- most places who beg for workers of any kind are really boring

\- I don't ever want to live somewhere where I'd feel like I'd have a really
hard time finding a new job if my current job fell through

\- since I'm remote, and travel a lot, access to nonstop flights to almost
anywhere is a massive convenience

These kind of programs can probably be a great deal for a very narrow slice of
remote workers, the freelancers who are at a stage in their life where a big
house and yard and easy access to Costco is more important than arts and
culture and nightlife and being able to pick from 2 nonstops to LA or London
every hour. And thats OK.

The only catch is probably whether the cities who are offering incentives to
family-minded remote workers who don't care about the big city amenities can
offer school districts and parks and stuff like that which is important to
that audience... "Tulsa" doesn't exactly have a brand that makes me think of
it as a place to raise a well-rounded child with diverse educational and
extracurricular opportunities, but that could very well just be a branding
problem.

~~~
cossatot
The town has its merits. The arts--especially museums--are quite good, as is a
lot of the downtown architecture and housing in midtown ( _gorgeous_ houses).
It is an oil town after all. With that also comes its fair share of
conspicuous consumption in terms of shi-shi restaurants and shopping if that's
your thing. The oil industry has also brought in more diversity than you'd
think, particularly people from the middle east. The music scene used to be
great though fairly country oriented (with lots of blues, rock and swing
influence and a big independent/DIY aesthetic), though that genre has
certainly lost almost all of its vitality and I expect Tulsa's music scene has
gone the same way. The philharmonic and ballet also used to be decent (could
be still?) and tickets may be cheap and available enough to just drop in if
you're interested.

In terms of big-city amenities, arts, culture, nightlife, etc. it definitely
beats the South SF Bay area on all fronts except cheap, delicious Asian
restaurants. But it can't compete with LA, SF proper, DC...

You can also expose your children to experiences like having horses, which is
harder in cities, but contributes to well-roundedness in a variety of ways.
You can even go to the museum in the morning and go ride horses in the
afternoon because getting from A to B is easy.

That being said, it is a pretty conservative place, and it's a long way from
anywhere that's not (outside of college towns), and it's a long way from
anywhere that looks different except the Ozarks. You'd probably be fine as a
non-surfing liberal atheist except dating could really suck. Life could also
be pretty hard for various ethnicities and other sorts of minorities, but less
so than most other places within a thousand miles.

WARNING: DIGRESSION

In my experience with many of these places though, a lot of the problems are
with the mindset, both of the city itself and of individuals who kind of fall
in line.

You can move to a big coastal city and feel the energy of the place--movers
moving, shakers shaking--and it's kind of true but it can be very hard to tap
into that energy unless you're already connected and have a fair amount of
disposable income. If you want to do things, make things, start a business,
paint, build boats, join a band, or whatever, it's a lot easier to do in a
place where you can afford a garage and not live 40 min outside the city, and
where you aren't slammed just trying to pay $3000/month in rent.

If you want to be an active participant in arts, music, crafts, etc. it is
generally easier to do in a place like Tulsa or Salt Lake City. You'll have
more time and perhaps more income, and networking is pretty easy when the
networks are small. You may or may not outgrow the scene eventually. The
downside is that people spend a lot of time bitching about how nothing is
going on in their small scene or small city and how it'd be so much better to
be in a big city with the famous people in their field, and this can be
demoralizing to the more sensitive or inexperienced.

However if you want to be a passive participant, a spectator, then it's
probably better to be in a city where you can go from gallery to gallery and
drink wine and gossip, or if you have the cash on hand to see the luminaries
in your musical genre of choice play every Friday night.

