Running head: ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY 1

Annotated Bibliography:

Colonias-Poverty at UTEP

Michael Kneeskern

University of Texas at El Paso

RWS 1301

Dr. Vierra

Oct. 23, 2018

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY 2

Research Questions

1. What is UTEP doing to ease the situation in colonias?

2. How long have these colonias existed? What caused them?

3. What are other issues that residents in colonias face (e.g. social stigma)?

4. What types of people affected? Is it disproportionate to the local poulation?

5. Is there a reason they are only found along the U.S.-Mexico border?
ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY 3

Annotated Bibliography

Abt, P. (2017). There's a third-world america that no one notices. Retrieved

from https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/theres-a-third-world-america-that-no-

one-notices/2017/11/21/640c4c1a-c499-11e7-aae0-

cb18a8c29c65_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.f8368001da2e

Abt (2017) claims that colonias deprives families of the opportunities that would allow

them to climb out of poverty. He justifies this by saying that the areas are prone to

flooding, meaning that the children living there cannot go to school after heavy storms.

Further justification is that colonias have a high rate of diseases like tuberculosis, typhoid

and dysentery. With such severe ailments, the residents must take time off work

cementing their impoverished status, and that is before considering whether they will go

to the hospital or attempt to fight it without treatment, both of which come with a much

higher price than solely lost salary.

Francis, S. (2004). American immigration policy contributes to poverty. In M. Williams (Ed.),

Poverty and the homeless (pp. 82-84). Farmington Hills, Michigan: Greenhaven Press.

According to Francis (Francis, 2004, p. 84), immigrants bring their impoverished culture

to the country they’re immigrating to. This is in response to the declining median income

in New York City and multiple cities throughout New Jersey, which correlates to

increased immigration numbers in the respective areas. He also brings attention to

Hunterdon County, New Jersey, which has not experienced the same economic shift or

immigration influx as its neighboring counties (Francis, 2004, 82). His evidence to

support this claim, outside of the correlation between medium income and regional

immigration, is that 25% of the Hispanic population of the United States lives below the

poverty line.
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Giron, R. (2016). Evaluation of point of use reverse osmosis systems for drinking water

in Colonias (Master's in environmental engineering). Available from ProQuest.

(10251655). Retrieved from https://0-search-proquest-

com.lib.utep.edu/docview/1876049808?accountid=7121

Oscar Daniel Ramirez Groin (2016) claims that access to clean water is a privilege. His

evidence for this claim is multiple locations along the U.S.-Mexico called “Colonias.”

These are low-income neighborhoods without basic infrastructure, including running

water. People living in these conditions have tried to mitigate these issues by using water

bottles, but this solution is ineffective because water bottles are not conducive to

showering. Compounded upon that, colonias are generally located far from places which

reliably sell water bottles. Other colonias have collection systems from domestic wells,

but the water from these wells are not clean based on the EPA standards. The last

solution presented for these locations is hauled water. While hauled water is fresh when it

arrives, it is often stored for later use. During this time, the sitting water gets

contaminated.

Korc, M. (2011). Application of the water poverty index in border colonias of

west texas (Masters of Public Health). Available from Proquest. Retrieved from https://0-

search-proquest-

com.lib.utep.edu/pqdtglobal/docview/916610649/1378A8456FF4EC4F2F9/1

According to Korc (2011), the history and creation of colonias can be tracked all the way

back to roughly the 1940s with the Bracero program and the Industrialization program in

1965 (p. 1). The history of such events is often unclear at best in a great many situations

with trace explanations through many long past actions, for the history of

the colonias this was no different. The evidence he supports this claim with is the demand
ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY 5

for adequate affordable housing, which lead many Texas land owners to build houses on

non-farmable land with limited infrastructure to sell to low income families (p. 1).

Miera, N., Ory, M., & Zhan, D. (2008). Health related quality of life among Mexican Americans

living in colonias at the texas-mexico border. Social science and medicine () Retrieved

from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S027795360700665X

According to Minera (2008), residents of colonias suffer from a low health related quality

of life, or HRQL for short (p. 1). This is in response to their research which was itself

conducted because of the lack of study into this specific topic. The evidence is based on

going to colonias and doing health checkups on them. They specifically looked at

demographic health factors (such as gender, age, education, health insurance, length of

time living in the colonia, smoking and drinking habits, and co-morbidity conditions) and

socioenvironmental factors (perceived problems related to healthcare access, housing,

recreation, social issues, and physical enviroments). Through all of these factors, and the

research conducted, they justified their claim.

National coalition for the homeless (2004). American immigration policy contributes to poverty.

In M. Williams (Ed.), Poverty and the homeless (pp. 85-91). Farmington Hills, Michigan:

Greenhaven Press.

According to the national coalition for the homeless (2004), homelessness is caused by a

variety of social factors (p. 85). This is because there is an amount of debate as to how

homelessness comes to be. Their evidence for this is a set of qualities that they note as

deteriorating the potential for many to gain housing. These qualities are eroding work

opportunities, a decline in public assistance, a lack of affordable housing, limited housing

assistance, lack of affordable health care, domestic violence, mental illness and addiction

disorders (pp. 85 – 91). They go through each of these topics with at least one paragraph
ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY 6

if not a couple pages to fully explain the connection, and their reasoning is well thought

out.

Perez, D. (June 22, 2017). Miners build rainwater collection system in colonia. Retrieved

from https://www.utep.edu/newsfeed/campus/Miners-Build-Rainwater-Harvesting-

System-in-Colonia.html

Daniel (2017) claims that the students involved in the project discovered and practiced

new skills such as project management and teamwork. Furthermore, it is said that these

skills will be critical for their professional success as engineers. The evidence for

this is that, while the project was supervised by CERM, the project itself was led and

executed by students. This means, they had to schedule meetings to discuss and design

the final draft of their machine. They also had to install it together, like the image on the

article shows.

Ramos I., Davis L., He Q., May M. & Ramos K. (2008). Immigrant minority health.

Ramos (2008) claims that the colonias on the U.S. – Mexico border are a result of the

1965 border industrialization program. The reason for this claim is because there has

been confusion as to how these colonias have come to be. The evidence for this is that the

creation of jobs through the border industrialization program bolstered an influx of

immigration both domestically between states and from outside of the country. This large

influx meant that there wasn’t enough housing for all of the residents, and the

immigration has not stopped since. As the desperation for housing increased, some

responded by establishing colonias.

Roman, M. (2018). One project at a time. The Prospector, pp. 4. Retrieved from

https://digitalcommons.utep.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1317&context=prospector
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According to Roman (2018), a group of UTEP students built a rainwater collection

system for the colonia on the outskirts of Presidio, Texas known as Las Pampas. It was a

collaborated effort between the Center for Environmental Resource Management

(CERM) and UTEP’s Engineers for a Sustainable World (ESW). They attached these

rainwater systems to two houses in 2017 using tanks donated by the Coca-Cola bottling

company in El Paso for storage. It was headed by Jesus Placencia, a UTEP alumni, who

was working as a research assistant for CERM at the time. A member of the team Alexis

Lopez said it was a great learning experience for everyone involved.

Snow, D. A. (1993). Down on their luck: A study of homeless street people. Berkeley, CA:

University of California Press.

According to Snow (1993), one of the dimensions of homelessness is familial support,

specifically, the lack thereof (p. 8). The reason they needed to address this was because,

at the time, the perception of homelessness was simply that they were people who lack

permanent residence. Their evidence for this is the series of case studies they wrote about

in the monograph which shows that a large amount of the homeless population cannot

seek a remedy to their situation by appeals to their family, for a myriad of reasons such as

having recently immigrated and others. This dimension allows us to see that even with

some form of residence like a shelter or a shack, does not mean these people in extreme

poverty are not homeless.

Timmer, D., Eitzen, Stanley & Talley, Kathryn. (1994). Paths to homelessness. 5500 Central

Avenue, Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press.

According to Timmer (1994), homelessness has some disquieting relations to race (p. 3).

They made note of this because it ties into some issues that they were seeing in the time

where people were accusing personal responsibility over, say, job discrimination. Their
ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY 8

evidence for this is that in 1991 11.3% of the white population lived below the poverty

line while the percentage was 28.7% for Latino people and 32.7% for African Americans.

They then look to the population in extreme poverty and see very similar statistics. Due

to these numbers, they find it reasonable t say that there is seemingly something bigger

going on than personal failings.

Valle, K. (2014). Living on the edge. The Prospector, pp. 24. Retrieved from

https://digitalcommons.utep.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1193&context=prospector

According to Valle (2014), a UTEP student lived in a colonia only an hour outside of El

Paso. This colonia, known as Hueco Tanks, was what Damaris Reyes, the student in

question, called home with her family. She told Valle about many of the daily challenges,

including going without water for two or three days, and being very cautious of using

water with the knowledge that it was a greatly limited resource for them. Timothy

Collins, a sociology and anthropology professor, says that it is greatly unlikely for El

Paso to do anything due to the small population that lives there, and the expense of

implementing the infrastructure that far out.