The topic in the supermarket checkout line was presidential politics. My husband and I, just back from the Democratic National Convention, had on our Obama buttons, so it was natural that the fellow ahead of us brought up the election. Then the cashier, unprompted, changed the subject to more local matters.

“I can’t wait to vote that Gatsas out. What they are doing to the schools just isn’t right. And that Tom Brennan? He’s an idiot.”

Although we had been away for a week, we had followed Manchester news over the Internet. Parents (and grandparents, like our checkout lady) are outraged over school conditions. My grand-nephew, a Central senior, is in an advanced math class with 37 students. He has had a substitute teacher in another class since the first day of school. The towns of Candia and Hooksett are furious at Manchester’s failure to live up to its contracts, and they are threatening to pull their students.

The first message on our voicemail was from a former Manchester administrator wondering if the State of New Hampshire had sufficient grounds to take over control of the district due to the city’s failure to meet state requirements. The school committee is upset over alleged failures to discipline problem students, but cuts in the number of assistant principals have made it impossible to investigate and punish all code of conduct violations.

School district leadership’s response has not been helpful. When it was reported that one Hillside Middle School math class has 42 students, a likely violation of educational standards and safety codes, the response wasn’t, “let’s hire another teacher,” but “let’s put the class in the cafeteria.”

Superintendent Tom Brennan is not an idiot; he is dealing with an irresponsible budget and an impossible situation. However, saying things like, “there’s always a concern, theoretically, about having large numbers” doesn’t make parents feel like he is fighting for his true constituents: the children. Overcrowded classrooms are a real problem today, not in theory.

I also don’t think Mayor Ted Gatsas intended to preside over a school district in disarray. Yet he displayed a “what, me worry” attitude that cost him credibility when he said, “maybe those kids this year will get a great education.” Great mayors don’t gamble with children’s educations. A good mayor and chairman of the school board should be embarrassed that children are in classes of 40 or more. He should be apologizing that sending districts are accusing us of breaching our contracts with them. A good mayor knows that the true bottom line of a city isn’t the tax rate, but the success rate of our schools.

Everything that is happening in Manchester could have been predicted. When the mayor introduced his budget last spring, schools were already understaffed due to the failure to fill vacancies. His budget was guaranteed to push a district already on the brink off the ledge. Mayor Gatsas’s quest to force teachers to renegotiate their contract seemed to be a higher priority than educating the kids. When 10 aldermen overrode his veto to keep about 40 more district employees, we all hoped that was enough duct tape and baling wire to hold things together. It wasn’t.

While we were in Charlotte, convention speaker after speaker, such as Mayor Castro of San Antonio and First Lady Michelle Obama, talked about how their parents impressed upon them that school provided the key to achieving the American dream. Congressmen, governors and senators talked about the opportunity that education had provided to them. They all had learned the same lesson growing up: Work hard, study hard, make something of yourself. It’s not just the American dream; it’s the American bargain.

That’s why people are so angry in Manchester. Denying children a quality education breaches the deal we have with every child in the public schools: we will give you the tools, so if you work and study hard, you will have the same opportunities as every other American child. Mayor Gatsas has promised a new deal: we will give you an overcrowded classroom, and we won’t promise you a desk, but maybe it will work out for you, kiddo.

That’s not good enough.

Mayor Gatsas now says it is time to “blow up” the delivery of education in Manchester. The problem is, his policies already have blown up education in Manchester. No commission will put the pieces back together in time for this school year. If he wants Manchester to remain a great city, he needs to reverse course and fix the problem now. Otherwise, we will continue to lose students, the best teachers and administrators will look elsewhere for employment, and new homeowners and businesses are going to pass Manchester by for other towns and cities.

Kathy Sullivan is a Manchester attorney and member of the Democratic National Committee. She was chairman of the state Democratic Party from 1999-2007.