A New View of Vacant Houses

Then last year, each heard about a Senate bill that would have led to the legalization of many immigrants. Enraged, Kipp skipped work to send a letter of protest to every member of Congress. Pannell also began writing.

They became friends at the county board meetings each began attending and speaking at last summer. Kipp and Pannell were thrilled when the county's illegal-immigration resolution passed in July, even as opponents warned that the policy would divide immigrant families.

"We don't worry about the family of someone who's robbed a bank," Kipp said. "They knew the consequences."

"They say we're breaking up families," Pannell said. "No, they are."

Now Pannell and Kipp take "field trips" around West Gate, snapping photos of suspected zoning violations, which they report to the county. They have been regulars at meetings of Help Save Manassas, whose members shared their sense of triumph at a recent gathering.

One woman reported that a Wal-Mart was "empty" post-crackdown. Another said she "actually got someone who speaks English" at a drive-through.

"We took what was an impossible task in so many people's eyes and within a period of a year fixed it," Letiecq told about 30 people at Manassas City Hall. Illegal immigrants, he said, are "getting the message, and they're leaving."

Some of those observations might boil down to perception. Kipp, Pannell and some of their neighbors cited drops in lines and Latinos at the Prince William Hospital emergency room and the neighborhood post office. Donna Ballou, a hospital spokeswoman, said traffic at the emergency room has remained steady. Patrick Murphy, a spokesman for the U.S. Postal Service, said the Manassas branch had reported no decline in customers or revenue.

Back on Lafayette, change is clear, even if the reasons behind it are not. Pannell and Kipp walked by a darkened house with a large addition off the back and a "For Sale" sign out front. It housed about a dozen people, Pannell said.

"They would play music so loud -- mariachi," Pannell said. So loud, she said, that it would trigger the car alarm of the longtime resident next door, who would let the alarm ring to annoy the mariachi listeners.

"This house I could write a book on," Pannell said wearily, approaching a white house a massive paved driveway, which she said was crammed with as many as 11 cars a few months back. "There could easily have been 25 people here at one time. All men. Not a child. Not a female."

Now it is for sale.