The Gainesville City Board of Education cannot gain access to about $7 million in capital outlay funds that could have been used to fix leaky roofs in five school buildings because the district has a budget deficit, Superintendent Merrianne Dyer said.

Three elementary schools, the old middle school and the high school’s old gym all need roof replacements.

On Wednesday, heavy rains prompted an evacuation of 700 students at Fair Street IB World School because rain was seeping into an electrical room at the school. Everyone was safe, and children were returned to the school later that afternoon.

The evacuation has more residents pressing district leaders for answers on how the roofs fell into such disrepair.

Dyer said the capital outlay funds were appropriated by the General Assembly and have accumulated over the past several years. Because the school system has a deficit of about $780,000, those funds cannot be used to fix roofs until the system can balance its budget, she said.

Dyer said barring unexpectedly drastic state cuts, the system should be out of the red by June.

"To get to our capital outlay money, the first step is to come out of deficit, because school systems are required to have a 20 percent contribution toward projects done with capital outlay funds," she said. "When we’re coming out of deficit this summer, it’s important that we have as much of a fund balance as we can because that will determine how much in capital outlay funds we can access upon appropriation from the General Assembly."

Once the school system eliminates its deficit, it could use the funds within a year if the General Assembly supports the appropriations. That means if the school board eliminates its deficit by June 30, the end of this fiscal year, the system potentially could use capital outlay funds to replace roofs in summer 2011.

Dyer said she’s glad that possibility reduces the board’s reliance on the next SPLOST fund, a special 1 cent sales tax that could be approved by voters in 2012.

She said the board was aware there were capital outlay funds, but it was up to central office leaders to manage those funds.

Generally, larger school systems have staff members who manage capital outlay exclusively. At smaller systems, the assistant superintendent or the director of operations typically do so.

"That is an area that Gainesville City Schools needed improvement in managing. We are very aware it is an area that needs improvement, and we are diligently working on that," Dyer said.

As a principal at Fair Street IB World School prior to 2008, Dyer said the dry years preceding this rainy fall made the leaks more manageable and a less urgent issue for the school board.

Keith Vincent, director of maintenance and operations for Gainesville schools, said he is recommending that the board stick to the plan he, parents and principals ironed out at a charter school governance meeting Tuesday.

He said the leak in the electrical room at Fair Street was fixed within 20 minutes after students were evacuated. He said he is confident the repair will hold up under the next rain.

"We have taken care of the leak along the wall and the leak in the other electrical room. We’re in good shape," he said.

Vincent said he is eager to find out the exact figure the system has remaining from the SPLOST fund used to build the new $33 million Gainesville Middle School so workers can begin to replace the worst sections of the roof at Fair Street.

"As soon as we find out how much money we have left over from the SPLOST funds, we’ll have our construction manager on it right away," he said.

Dyer said she expects the board will have a final figure by its Oct. 19 board meeting and could take action on appropriating the funds.