Eric Scorsone

Dr. Eric Scorsone is Executive Director of the Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service.  Eric has over 25 years of public service in academic settings, as well as many years’ experience in state and local government.  He has expertise in state and local public finance and administration and regional economics.  His most recent position before joining UVA was at Michigan State University as Associate Professor and Founding Director of the MSU Extension Center for Local Government Finance & Policy, and director of the MSU Extension Institute of Public Utilities.  During his tenure at MSU, Dr. Scorsone went on leave for state-level appointments as Deputy State Treasurer at the Michigan Department of Treasury and Senior Economist at the Michigan Senate Fiscal Agency.  

Prior to MSU, Dr. Scorsone was an assistant professor and developed award winning extension programs in rural health economics and economic development in the Department of Agricultural Economics at the University of Kentucky. Prior to Kentucky, he served as an Economist for the Colorado Governor’s Office of State Planning and Budget and as a Senior Economist for the City of Aurora, Colorado.

Eric has worked on international development projects in Thailand, Macedonia and Indonesia, and has taught public performance management and public finance in the European Union at the University of Bologna, Italy, and the University of Valencia, Spain, amongst other locations. Just one example of his dedication to public service is the time he spent in Flint, Michigan, as Senior Advisor to Flint Mayor Sheldon Neeley, helping coordinate MSU Extension’s response to the water and financial crisis there —work for which his team won the Abraham Lincoln Award from the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture.  

Eric received his Ph.D. from Colorado State University, where his dissertation focused on economic models of growth in the Denver housing and labor markets. He received his Master’s from Michigan State University in Agricultural Economics, a B.B.A. in Economics from Loyola University of Chicago, and is a member of Alpha Sigma Nu. Eric has published in the Journal of Economic Issues, State and Local Government Review, Growth and Change, Journal of Appalachian Studies, Economic Development Quarterly, Publius, Public Money and Management, and International Review of Administrative Sciences. He is co-editor of the book “Handbook of Local Government Fiscal Health” and co-author of the books, “Local Government Financial Vulnerability” and “The Legal Foundations of Micro Institutional Performance”.  He has been interviewed by and quoted in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, The Bond Buyer, Detroit Free Press, Detroit News, The Atlantic, Newsweek, CNN, The Guardian, Fox Business and MSNBC.