Reinventing the Heartland

The story of one Heartland city’s efforts to reinvent itself for the innovation age is a powerful example of the change America needs. Every city in America wants to become a tech hub, yet so few succeed—and that’s the problem. Tech jobs, venture capital, and R&D are concentrated in a handful of big coastal cities, while the broad middle of the country is left out. But to thrive in the twenty-first century, cities must create innovation economies of their own and grow in more inclusive ways. In January 2020, Nicholas Lalla founded Tulsa Innovation Labs to help Tulsa, Oklahoma transition from its oil and gas legacy to tech. Lalla’s organization would go on to build the first tech-led economic development strategy in northeast Oklahoma’s history, raise over $200 million, and create thousands of tech jobs. This success catalyzed a massive, city-wide endeavor—the first time in American history a city has dedicated itself in such a concerted way to becoming a player in the innovation economy. Drawing upon Lalla’s experience in Tulsa, Reinventing the Heartland lays out a bold and pragmatic plan for urban reinvention, showing cities how to reorient their entire civic ecosystems toward inclusive tech-led growth. Each chapter covers a core plank of the action plan—from how cities can establish their own tech niche based on existing assets to how they can rapidly up-skill talent in the era of AI to how to build urban-rural partnerships and compete for federal funding as a region. In Reinventing the Heartland, Lalla provides the path forward, not just for Tulsa, but for any city ready to embrace the future. It engages timely issues affecting American society at large—from the pros and cons of remote work to the evolving role of higher education to the political consequences of the urban-rural divide. Lalla provides the path forward for America, not just in Tulsa, but across the Heartland and in any city ready to embrace the future.