The Department of Education is looking to lay claim to classrooms vacated by the Catholic Church, but deals to lease space from three schools have been put on hold.

Seeking to alleviate overcrowding in public schools, the city negotiated contracts with three of the 19 churches in Brooklyn and Queens forced to shutter their schools last year due to dwindling enrollment.

But Mayor Bloomberg announced last month that the city would have to delay 23 school construction projects, including the three deals with Catholic schools, unless Albany complies with a court order and sends the city billions more dollars in aid for schools.

The city is waiting to hear if Governor Pataki addresses the issue when he releases his executive budget tomorrow.

The city planned to spend $17 million to renovate the schools at St. Thomas Aquinas in Marine Park, Holy Innocents in Flatbush, and Our Lady of Refuge in Flatbush. All three are located in District 22 in southern Brooklyn.

Mr. Bloomberg announced the ambitious five-year, $13.1 billion capital plan in November 2003. From the outset Mr. Bloomberg has maintained that Albany should foot more than half of that total, or $6.5 billion.

That is just part of the $9 billion in capital funds that a state court has ordered Albany to pay following a decade-long battle over school financing led by the Campaign for Fiscal Equity.

Parents at P.S. 207 in Brooklyn are fuming over the change of plans. The elementary school was granted permission last year to add grades, up to eighth grade, and to use the recently shuttered classrooms at the nearby St. Thomas Aquinas Church. Now that funding has been pulled, parents are scrambling to find placements for their children in the fifth grade. They learned about the change when students returned to school after winter break earlier this month.

“Now we’re in a crisis. We set plans for our lives on this” the co-president of P.S. 207, Cathy Sullivan, said. Her son, who is in the fifth grade, planned to attend sixth grade at the school. Ms. Sullivan said she missed the deadline to apply for several other schools.

“How wonderful that the building wasn’t going to just sit there and it was going to be filled with children again. How fantastic that the Department of Education was going to lease some of those buildings and make some smaller middle schools – now we have to raise our voices,” Ms. Sullivan said.

Hundreds of parents in the area are expected to attend a meeting hosted by state Senator Martin Golden Thursday night to discuss the problem.

With Catholic schools facing more potential shutdowns and city schools facing severe overcrowding in some areas, the city may increasingly rely on renting space.

The deputy schools chancellor, Kathleen Grimm, said renting space can have “very severe drawbacks,” but it can address an immediate problem.

“You don’t have the same kind of space as when you build from scratch, but in very overcrowded regions it’s a very adequate way to get children out of classrooms,” Ms. Grimm said.

In September, the School for Sports Management moved into Our Lady of Solace in Coney Island. In Queens, P.S. 199 is leasing space from both St. Theresa and St. Raphael, the Department of Education said.

A spokesman for the Diocese of Brooklyn and Queens, Frank DeRosa, said the diocese is in ongoing discussions with the city about the deals. He said that the leases could potentially be an important source of income for the churches.