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A state judge ruled last night that an additional $5.6 billion must be spent on the city's public schoolchildren every year to ensure them the opportunity for a sound basic education that they are guaranteed under the State Constitution. Beyond that, another $9.2 billion must be spent over the next five years to shrink class sizes, relieve overcrowding and provide the city's 1.1 million students with enough laboratories, libraries and other places in which to learn. In his ruling - the latest in a 12-year court battle - Justice Leland DeGrasse of State Supreme Court in Manhattan adopted the recommendations made last November by a panel of lawyers and judges that he appointed. The panel held hearings for several months and ultimately came very close to recommending exactly what the plaintiffs, who sued to compel more money for the city's schools, had asked for. But the judge did not say how much of the money should come from the state or from the city, leaving unanswered one of the most contentious questions facing lawmakers. "We're very pleased," said Michael A. Rebell, executive director of the Campaign for Fiscal Equity, the plaintiff in the case. "After 12 years, there's finally a dollar figure. We hope the governor will sit down and meet with us, and with the Legislature. Let's wrap this thing up." The amount the judge ordered was nearly triple what Gov. George E. Pataki's lawyers had proposed to the court, and the governor's office said last night that it would appeal the decision, though New York's highest court has largely upheld Justice DeGrasse's earlier rulings. [more]