Topping the nearly $2 billion bill for the Dade district: aging air-conditioning units; outdated electrical systems; and everything that makes up a building’s shell — the windows, roofs, painting and more. That includes $463 million for building upgrades, like roofing and windows. Heating, ventilation and air-conditioning needs total $332 million. Electrical needs, including fire/safety, add up to $293 million, and plumbing, $275 million. The district is updating its survey of needed repairs and maintenance, which it does every five years.

Highlights from Broward’s list include $472 million for building replacements, $118 million for kitchen/cafeteria renovations, $111.4 million for classroom additions and $59.3 million for safety equipment like sprinklers and fire alarms.

Both districts keep up with problems that pose risks to students’ life or safety.

But in March 2010, cracks in concrete walls and columns at North Dade Middle caused an emergency. Days before students were scheduled to take the FCAT, officials shuttered the Opa-locka school because of concerns over the structural integrity of several buildings with cracks.

The 700 students had to move to another campus. They now study in older buildings at Carol City Senior High. The district is still working on North Dade Middle. With some buildings dating to 1957, the school had been slated to be demolished and replaced by 2011. Torrens said the school will reopen this year, with new classrooms, cafeteria, main office and new drop-off areas.

He doesn’t believe that kind of hazard is likely to occur at another campus. “At any point, that could happen, but I don’t expect that level of deterioration in our schools. You hear the schools are crumbling, yeah they’re crumbling, but we’re not going to allow students to be in an unsafe [building].”

American Senior High, Miami Norland Senior High, Hialeah Senior High and M.A. Milam K-8 Center need the most work, according to school district records.

Maintenance workers worry that small problems grow into bigger ones, especially with fewer people in their department. Last April, the district laid off 200 employees in facilities. Broward has lost more than 600 such jobs over the past five years.

That means there are fewer people to do routine maintenance, said Chuck Burdeen, executive director of the Dade County School Administrators’ Association. For example, checking trees on school grounds. Old trees topple and can cause damage or injury. In recent months, trees have fallen at Coral Terrace Elementary, the adult-education English Center and Southwest Miami Senior High.

“We’re worried someone could get really injured,” Burdeen said, adding: “If they gave us the money tomorrow, we couldn’t do the work because we don’t have the people.”

Leaky roofs, old AC

On rainy days at 60-year-old Stranahan High School in Fort Lauderdale, students walk carefully through the halls, dodging a patchwork of roof leaks.

School custodians pump pools of water from the cafeteria and auditorium, and ceiling tiles are often removed and laid out to dry in a storage room, out of concern that they will absorb too much water and come crashing down.

Built in 1951, Stranahan was in line to receive a $22 million overhaul in 2010, but the project, along with hundreds of others in Broward, was shelved that same year.