New Tricks for Old Bureaucracies: Improving Policy Outcomes for the Public Sector

Written by Joshua Schank, Emma Huang, and Marla Westervelt Berg

Coming Spring 2026 from Business Expert Press

Make friends. Fix processes. Change government.

It all begins with an idea. What if government could actually get things done?

New Tricks for Old Bureaucracies tells the inside story of how a small team at LA Metro’s Office of Extraordinary Innovation turned big ideas into real change. It is part playbook, part survival guide, and part reality check for anyone trying to make progress inside public institutions.

Written by three insiders who have been in the trenches, it shows how bureaucracy can evolve from the inside out and why it is worth the effort.

This work was funded in part by the Mineta Transportation Institute and published by Business Expert Press.

  • Partner, InfraStrategies and Sr. Fellow at UCLA Institute for Transportation Studies, Los Angeles

    Email: joshua.schank@infrastrategies.com

    Joshua is a Partner with InfraStrategies, a consulting firm that works with transportation organizations across the world on strategy, innovation, and policy. He is also a Research Associate at the Mineta Institute for Transportation at San Jose State University, and a Senior Fellow at the Institute for Transportation Studies at UCLA. He is the former Chief Innovation Officer with the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (LA Metro), and the former President and CEO of the Eno Center for Transportation, a national transportation think-tank based in Washington, DC. He is the co-author of All Roads Lead to Congress: The $300 Billion Fight Over Highway Funding.

  • Principal, InfraStrategies, Los Angeles

    Email: emma.huang@infrastrategies.com

    Emma is a Principal Consultant with InfraStrategies, where she helps transit agencies navigate critical challenges, from foundational strategy to implementing innovative service models and policies. She has led the development of major strategic plans including Dallas Area Rapid Transit’s 10-year strategic plan, Point B, San Mateo County Transit District’s plan, Moving San Mateo County, and CapMetro’s Strategic Plan. Prior to joining InfraStrategies, as a Manager with Los Angeles Metro’s Office of Extraordinary Innovation, Emma spent over six years focused on advancing strategic initiatives for the agency, including the development and implementation of an innovative FTA Mobility-on-Demand partnership with Via, Metro's Vision 2028 10-year strategic plan, and Metro’s Traffic Reduction Study exploring congestion pricing in Los Angeles County.

  • Principal, Cityfi, Chicago, IL

    Email: marla@cityfi.co

    Marla is a Principal at Cityfi, where she helps governments and private-sector companies - from early-stage startups to global firms - navigate the rules, politics, and partnerships that shape innovation in civic space. She was a founding member and Head of Research at LA Metro’s Office of Extraordinary Innovation, led global policy at the Coalition for Reimagined Mobility, and built regulatory strategy and data systems from the inside at Bird. Her work bridges public systems and private ambition to turn civic friction into real-world results. She began her career at the Eno Center for Transportation. 

“This collective story of aiming to make a positive difference, running into one brick wall or another, and then recalibrating to be smarter and more effective the next time around should be an inspiring lesson on growing throughout one’s career.”

Brian Taylor, Department of Urban Planning and Public Policy, UCLA

“Making change in public institutions is hard! Schank, Huang, and Westervelt recount amusing stories of their successes and failures at LA Metro to illustrate how we can make things happen!”

Nadine Lee, General Manager of Dallas Area Rapid Transit

“Anyone dedicated to reforming public agencies and modernizing transit service in cities should read New Tricks for Old Bureaucracies. You will not only enjoy an engaging book, but you will also gain valuable insights about the methods and pitfalls of prodding and coaxing bureaucratic organizations to improve processes, performance and outcomes for their constituents.”

David Bragdon, former Executive Director of Transit Center

“Cities face big transportation problems, and they cannot be solved without innovative thinking and major policy change. I love that in higher numbers, people are bringing their entrepreneurial spirit to the public sector. But as Joshua, Emma, and Marla outline, it is still not easy or guaranteed to succeed. Fortunately, they took some hard knocks that you can learn from, vs. making the same mistakes. The authors' persistence created positive change, and in this book, they distill some helpful lessons learned for anyone looking to do the same.”

Gabe Klein, Former Director of the Chicago and Washington, DC Departments of Transportation

UPCOMING EVENTS

November 12th - 13th, 2025

Joshua Schank will be speaking at CoMotion LA 2025

Los Angeles, CA