LITTLE ROCK—The University of Arkansas says it needs $215 million for its Fayetteville campus to repair buildings that haven’t been fixed or renovated for decades.

The chancellor of the flagship campus says repairs are needed on about 75 buildings. If work isn’t started soon, the last remaining option might be tearing structures down and rebuilding them—at a cost of $1.5 billion, Chancellor G. David Gearhart said.

“Some deferred maintenance has gone unaddressed for several decades,” Gearhart told university trustees meeting Friday at the university system’s Little Rock campus. “We simply can’t afford to put off these necessary infrastructure investments any longer.”

Gearhart said he will outline how he intends to pay for the repairs by April. A portion of the money will come from a $2-per-credit-hour student fee that had initially been imposed to help the school purchase the Fayetteville High School campus. The university withdrew a $50 million offer for the 40-acre site in August after negotiations fell apart.

Repairs are needed for buildings both old and relatively young. The Old Main building, 133 years old, needs about $1 million in repairs but it would cost $58 million to replace it. The Poultry Science building, just 13 years old, needs $500,000 in repairs but would cost $44 million to replace.

A 40-year-old science building needs $6.3 million for repairs or $82 million to replace, a campus wish list says.