"[t]oday practically every building in the system is plagued by disrepair." The second front described in the plan was a worsening capacity crisis driven by explosive growth in enrollment. The third front consisted of antiquated building interiors inadequate to support current educational needs. While BOE called for $7.5 billion in "barebones" funding, this five-year plan was originally budgeted at $3.4 billion, an amount later increased to $4.9 billion. BOE concluded that the inadequate funding of the plan would cause the over-all condition of the schools to get worse, not better. Additionally, many of the major modernizations of new schools originally funded for design back in the previous five-year plan were not scheduled for construction during the 1995-1999 plan. In June 1995 a commission appointed by then-Chancellor Cortines issued "A Report of the Commission on School Facilities and Maintenance Reform," known as the Levy Commission Report after its Chair, Harold Levy. 24 The Levy Commission found that the condition of New York City public school facilities constituted "a school infrastructure crisis." The Levy Commission discovered "shocking conditions in our schools, such as collapsing building facades, thoroughly rusted structural beams, falling masonry, precariously hung windows, and roof gables held together with wire." It found more than 760 buildings had serious problems with their heating and ventilation systems and 424 buildings required wholesale modernization. The Levy Commission also decried the fact that more than a quarter of all public schools, 343 buildings, had coal-burning [187 [187 Misc.2d Misc.2d 42] 42] boilers—a form of heating apparently that is extinct or nearly so in the rest of the City. 25 These findings were echoed in reports issued by the Regents and SED in 1996 and 1997. The Regents determined that facilities' needs in New York City were greater in dollar figures than those of the rest of the State combined. b . T h e U n i t e d F e d e rat i o n o f Te a c h e r s ' L a w s u i t In 1994, the United Federation of Teachers sued BOE over the conditions of New York City's public schools' facilities. The late Justice Friedman's 1998 decision notes that BOE did not contest the deplorable conditions in the City's schools. The decision cited a BOE memorandum that found 237 school buildings had immediately hazardous exterior conditions in need of repair. This list of 237 did not include nearly 150 buildings that had defective roofs or other building code violations. The court ordered the parties to settle a judgment providing for a safety plan. The plan adopted involved the extensive use of temporary scaffolding to safeguard people but did not involve the actual repair of defective conditions. As a result of this judgment close to one third of all school buildings in New York City at the time of trial had sidewalk shedding around their exteriors, simply to ensure minimal safety, not in preparation for remedial measures. c. Building Condition Assessment Survey The most recent comprehensive survey of the condition of New York City public school buildings is the building condition assessment survey (BCAS), conducted between late 1997 and mid-1998. Outside engineers and architects conducted visual inspection of approximately 340 building components identified by BOE. Each component was given a numerical rating: 1 (good), 2 (good to fair), 3 (fair), 4 (fair to poor) or 5 (poor). 26 Because not all components of a building are of equal importance, the outside engineers also assigned two additional [187 [187 Misc.2d Misc.2d 43] 43] ratings to each component: "purpose of action" and "urgency of action." The "purpose of action" ratings give some sense of the importance of a component's condition. In other words a building's parapet wall—though it may be rated 3 (fair condition) overall—could have a portion that is severely cracked. Such a wall might be considered a greater priority because of safety concerns than, for example, lighting in a gym that is rated 5 (poor condition). The most important purpose of action rating is "life safety" which describes a situation where the physical safety of the children and teachers who use the building is at risk. The second most important category is "structural" which means that the condition affects the building's structural integrity. The third category, "regulation code," denotes a condition that is in violation of applicable building codes and regulations. The remaining categories describe less severe conditions. The "urgency of action" categories describe the time frame within which work should be done based on the particular component's rate of deterioration. The BCAS results demonstrate that hundreds of New York City public school buildings have serious structural deficiencies. Two hundred thirty-one school buildings were identified as having three to four major exterior components ranked with a 3, 4 or 5 coupled with a life safety or structural "purpose of action" rating. BOE has determined that such scores require complete overhauls of these exteriors and there was no evidence at trial tending to cast any doubt on that conclusion. An additional 114 buildings have roofs that must be replaced. Still more buildings have severe problems with their windows and external masonry. Each of these problems concerns the integrity of buildings' external "envelopes" which the evidence demonstrates is a prerequisite to buildings' physical health. Defendants agree that BCAS is the most probative measure of the condition of New York City public school buildings, but they differ in their interpretation of BCAS data. Defendants offered an interpretation of BCAS by their expert witness, Robert O'Toole, who was for 10 years the chief fiscal officer in charge of the Tucson, Arizona, school district where one of his duties was oversight of school facilities. Mr. O'Toole conducted two analyses based on BCAS data designed to gauge the health of New York City school facilities. [187 [187 Misc.2d Misc.2d 44] 44] In his first analysis, Mr. O'Toole examined the average scores of 251 of the approximately 350 building components examined in the BCAS survey. According to Mr. O'Toole these 251 components embraced all the components in the architectural, electrical and mechanical categories, which he described as the most basic categories. He found that the average score among all school buildings for 83.6% of the 251 components was greater than 3, or fair. Only 41 of the components had an average score of 3 or less. Mr. O'Toole's second analysis attempted to ascertain a per square foot cost for the repairs indicated by BCAS. This study encompassed 921 of the approximately 1,400 school structures surveyed in BCAS. Using the cost estimates included in the BCAS, Mr. O'Toole derived square foot costs for