Well forget the racism report costs/fines. In general, the price of everything it takes to run a business whether it be sports or otherwise continues to go up. You have further increased energy bills and various other overheads, now increased national insurance and minimum wage costs following the latest government budget. Yet Essex's revenue income essentially remains the same. There's no new and improved TV deal on the horizon to bump it up like you'd expect in football, lazy players continue to moan/campaign for less games which hurts the club further and a rotting Chelmsford provides zero 'non-cricketing revenue'.
A huge financial loss would be of no surprise, the club cannot sustainably operate in its current guise unless it either embraces private investment and/or Chelmsford is renovated/replaced/moved on from entirely. Everyone is scared to admit that, but it's a fact.
Having listened to the bloke supposedly now in charge on BBC Essex, he hardly inspires confidence. At least JS had the air of a leader about him.