Over the last few weeks, Elon Musk has made it clear that he’s just about up to the brim with California’s rules and regulations, especially in the wake of COVID-19, where he has become the face of blatant defiance agains government orders against shutdowns and stay-at-home orders. He’s made it clear that while he’s about workplace safety, he’s hell-bent against the shutdown and has ripped apart Alameda County, California on Twitter, has actually sued the county for constitutional violations (the whole time venting off about his distaste for the regulations), and made it very clear that he would be more than happy to pull up stakes and leave the state for a different location…not just manufacturing, but Tesla’s entire headquarters. He’s even talked about ditching the Fremont plant (the former GM Fremont/NUMMI plant) entirely.
Enter a whole host of places that would genuflect on command if Musk was to bring Tesla manufacturing to their location. And in one case, he didn’t even have to ask, because Tulsa, Oklahoma is courting him with all of the grace and charm of a cat in heat. It’s a known fact that Gigafactory 5, the manufacturing location that will build the Cybertruck, is expected to take roots and start growing somewhere in the middle of flyover country. Many cities have perked up, but the strangeness over Tusla’s actions are almost beyond belief. The city’s famous “Golden Driller” statue, a 75-foot tall feature at the Tulsa Expo Center, recently received a re-skin to look more like a creepy, stone faced Elon, and then there’s a Twitter page that’s about as blatant as it gets: @BigFuckingField, which is “seeking Tesla Cybertruck Gigafactory”. That’s nice and subtle. It’s meme culture, mostly, but overall the city seems hell-bent on offering up a full-blown shrine to Elon if he will just bring the proposed Gigafactory 5 to town. They have to beat out other potential locations, such as Austin, Texas and they’re willing to do just about any tap dance needed in order to be picked as a winner.
Question: has anybody told Elon what a tornado siren sounds like yet?
Ok first off the Driller shit is WAY over the top but I guess if you are trying to court a manic sociopath into bringing his toy factory to town then, well. crazy meet crazy. I’m a Tulsa native and I love this place. Tulsa has a lot to offer for a manufacturer. Cheap real estate , low cost of living, abundant and inexpensive power, as a bonus for Tesla a strong and growing wind energy industry and a talented blue collar workforce.
The downside for us is that like most other places we will give away far too much to land Tesla. The tax breaks and freebies will cost us millions ( billions ? ) in perpetuity. We rent American Airlines a multimillion dollar hangar the city owns for $1 a year and we rent Navistar Bus plant a city owned former bomber factory for $1 a year as well. That plant has 30 million in “ deferred maintenance “ ( aka we aren’t taking care of your shit) by Navistar who is now threatening to leave.
If cities and states would fucking QUIT competing to give the most away to multi billion dollar companies and compete on merit instead of handing out tax payer funded bribes all of us would be better off.
Can Tesla’s succeed in Tulsa ? Absolutely! Will Tesla come to Tulsa ? Who knows? Tulsa should win hands down over Austin. Austin’s infrastructure is WAY overburdened, traffic is a nightmare. But Texas doesn’t much care about zoning and has much lower environmental standards. In Texas it’s fine to put your fertilizer plant next to your elementary school in the middle of town so when it blows up everyone is screwed. When it comes to zoning laws and environmental regs we may not be the best but damn, we aren’t as lax as Texas.
We may look foolish in some ways as we chase Tesla but if we don’t give away the farm and they land here it will be a Win Win for Tulsa and Tesla.
Elon can get his “medical” card in OK and smoke a fattie after signing the contract, they still get pissy about that in Texas….tornadoes happen in Austin too…
So BS quit slapping my city around. You’ve been here for the Throwdown in T town, Drag Week etc… you know it’s a good place with good people. Unfortunately like every other place we get to look stupid from time to time.
Yeah Bryan
Your embarrassing yourself with your stupidity and no vision of the future. Tulsa can set a new standard along with Texas as well the utilize it’s knowledge of new technology and better economy to move forward with both Fossil fuel and Green energy products. Open your Mind Moron….
Kevin
First of I’m from New York and live in Tulsa! And Tesla to Tulsa is THE best Idea EVER and the Elon driller is the best complment ever and Elon knows that Oklahoma’s also are smart enough to know tornado sirens are old school out dated and meant for people outdoors we know when tornadoes are forecasted and aren’t dumb enough to rely on outdated sirens used in the 50s moron! Oklahoma Tulsa is the oil and communications capital do your research and fact check!!
How about some cheese to go with that whine
Ok first off the Driller shit is WAY over the top but I guess if you are trying to court a manic sociopath into bringing his toy factory to town then, well. crazy meet crazy. I’m a Tulsa native and I love this place. Tulsa has a lot to offer for a manufacturer. Cheap real estate , low cost of living, abundant and inexpensive power, as a bonus for Tesla a strong and growing wind energy industry and a talented blue collar workforce.
The downside for us is that like most other places we will give away far too much to land Tesla. The tax breaks and freebies will cost us millions ( billions ? ) in perpetuity. We rent American Airlines a multimillion dollar hangar the city owns for $1 a year and we rent Navistar Bus plant a city owned former bomber factory for $1 a year as well. That plant has 30 million in “ deferred maintenance “ ( aka we aren’t taking care of your sh*t) by Navistar who is now threatening to leave.
If cities and states would QUIT competing to give the most away to multi billion dollar companies and compete on merit instead of handing out tax payer funded bribes all of us would be better off.
Can Tesla’s succeed in Tulsa ? Absolutely! Will Tesla come to Tulsa ? Who knows? Tulsa should win hands down over Austin. Austin’s infrastructure is WAY overburdened, traffic is a nightmare. But Texas doesn’t much care about zoning and has much lower environmental standards. In Texas it’s fine to put your fertilizer plant next to your elementary school in the middle of town so when it blows up everyone is screwed. When it comes to zoning laws and environmental regs we may not be the best but damn, we aren’t as lax as Texas.
We may look foolish in some ways as we chase Tesla but if we don’t give away the farm and they land here it will be a Win Win for Tulsa and Tesla.
Elon can get his “medical” card in OK and smoke a fattie after signing the contract, they still get pissy about that in Texas….tornadoes happen in Austin too…
So BS quit slapping my city around. You’ve been here for the Throwdown in T town, Drag Week etc… you know it’s a good place with good people. Unfortunately like every other place we get to look stupid from time to time. You know kind of like misspelling a cities name in the headline…..
Wow bang shift news , I cant stop thinking of other news that would draw a audience. O wait due to the pandemic this is the only thing truly worth reporting. Brian bro throw down in t-town was a great show the year you and your crew came out . Your write up praised the auto community here and our city as a whole.then you come off the ropes to Express how you truly feel about Tulsa .this is a prime example of editorial targeting (bullying). But in all actuality you must have lost apart of yourself here. It’s got you all in your man emotions and it show’s. So as you target tulsa for swinging Elon’s jewels we are happy to know Tulsa lives in your head rent free.
So you wanna crack about tornado’s in this lovely corridor we call tornado alley. This is the land where everyone is a storm spotter/chasers. We produce some of the best in meteorology. It’s truly sad that you just assume theres no tornado producing storms in South Africa. They might not be as advanced as the us with warning systems in place but they happen. So Elon grew up with the same threat as we did. How dare you insult his intelligence.
Thanks for showing your true colors BRIAN…
Somebody get this guy a t-shirt
BS stop slapping my city around. Everybody looks stupid sometimes. You know like when you misspell a cities name in the headline…..
All I can say is, if Tesla goes to Tulsa, there will be some criminial corruption going on with Oklahoma’s tax laws. Companies go to Texas, Tennessee, and Florida for a reason, it’s cheaper to operate there. That’s a good thing, don’t get me wrong, but the rest of the country is engaged in trying to lure companies away from other states, or (through tax-incentive packaging) keep their biggest employers in-state. So rest assured, if Tesla goes to OK, there will be some serious tax-law twisting to get them there. That means the regular golks will have had the woll pulled over their eyes once again, right before they take it right up the keester.
Tulsa is the next cool city emerging in the U.S.
The infrastructure and history from the early 1900’s in this city sets them up well for growth and Elon sees it…if he chooses Tulsa, in ten years this city will be so rockin’…
OKSnake08 hit the nail 100% on the head….and I live in Texas
At least It’s still an American company , many American cities already genuflected to get foreign car maker plants .
This is one of the worst news articles I’ve ever read.
It truly is a dumb ass article!
Agree
Im a tulsa native..and im am embarrassed by how my city is acting. That would push me away as a business person. They not handing out thousand dollar checks on the street if he brings his factory here.if you want business to come here you gotta let go of the old ways you hold on to..you want clean air and water but you want factory and businesses.cant have both.you wanna close down the city at 2am. Cities that have manufacturing like tesla dont close…and where you gonna build this factory..half of the stuff yawl been promising for years hasnt been built…and when they leave is oklahoma gonna show hate like they did Kevin Durant
You’re not from Tulsa. We learn how to spell ya’ll in the first grade.
What morons think you have to give up clean water and air for a new manufacturing facility. Jesus where do these people come from?
Embarrassing is spelling the city’s name wrong in the title of your story. Dork!
Oklahoma isn’t embarrassed about shit! The driller is dressed up for all kinds of special events and holidays in Tulsa. WTF is embarrassing about that? These bullshit “reports” are as idiotic as the person reporting them.
you meant texas, BOOMER SOONER BABY !!
Bad idea…
I live in Texas and have been reading all of this….I’m glad it’s going to Tulsa…lot of jobs and who knows might move there.
We are not worried about what a bangshit i mean shift website has to say. Say what you want about tesla stock value says it all. Tulsa has hard workers and great people. We come together like no other part of the country in time of need. All the things going on in the world you write about tulsa embarrassment ha. You done nothing but made you look arrogant your self and to this site.
From the bottom of our hearts in tulsa go fuck yourself
Very well said, Oksnake08.
No you’re not Tulsa.
Don’t listen to the hate. I hope you get it.
First of I’m from New York and live in Tulsa! And Tesla to Tulsa is THE best Idea EVER and the Elon driller is the best complment ever and Elon knows that Oklahoma’s also are smart enough to know tornado sirens are old school out dated and meant for people outdoors we know when tornadoes are forecasted and aren’t dumb enough to rely on outdated sirens used in the 50s moron! Oklahoma Tulsa is the oil and communications capital do your research and fact check!!
They said Tulsa thirsty lol heck no.
I was a Purolator employee for the full 7 years of tax breaks the co. was given to locate to Tulsa, tax breaks ended and all of us good worker’s out on our asses and back to suck minimum wage jobs, if could be found. Don’t feed me promises of sweet lifetime suckcess !!!
Bryan, I regret to inform you that as I was reading your “article” I could only hear Bill Hader’s character Stefon from SNL covering his while talking. Agreed that some of it is over the top but the way you write is sad and amusing. You sound like a left coast idiot or one of the snowbirds that moved to Florida to wreck that state that has voted yourself into socialism and is a bit spiteful towards “flyover country” and our beliefs in freedom and our constitutional republic. F*@¿ off and whimper elsewhere.
You are talking about it, aren’t you?
Since when is appealing to the ego of a (real) billionaire over-the-top?
Musk will get to write the rules if he locates in Tulsa. I think the city is trying to make that abundantly clear to him. If the plant is located in Austin, it will just be another plant. Big, sure. But they have tons of larger tech companies there. Also, the state of Texas and the city are not going to bend-over-backwards for Tesla.
Painting the Golden Driller is creepy – it was kinda meant to be in order to get attention – which it has.
To those against Tesla coming here to Tulsa. We have Kimberly-Clark, Navistar, Whirlpool, American Airlines, Spirit Aerospace, Williams Companies, Nordam and Sofidel to name a few of the top companies here in this town. That’s not including the new Amazon warehouse opening up here in a couple months.
I believe Tulsa can hold its own in a competitive environment. The sad part is the Musk has already said he is moving to either Nevada or Texas earlier this month. To that conclusion, his mind is already made up.