The kids' bikes are strewn over a yellowing front lawn and an open garage is brimming with family clutter. Jackie Collins, a mother of young children, comes on to the porch and looks down her road.

“If you go down the street, you will see Bush-Cheney signs in one yard, Kerry-Edwards in the next. Bush in one, Kerry in the next,” she says, shaking her head at the competing yard signs on display outside almost every other house on Southern Vista Street. “It is a very confusing election.”