Local governments brace for budgetary impact of coronavirus

The Great Recession was devastating for local governments. County and city governments cut slashed budgets for things like parks. School districts laid off teachers and sent class sizes skyrocketing. And the recovery didn’t come quickly or smoothly. It took years. And finally, local governments in the last few years have mostly been able to return to their pre-recession spending levels.

But now, whatever we end up calling this current pandemic-linked financial crisis, it could wreak the same amount of damage as the previous economic collapse in 2008, if not more, on local governments.

The larg...