EL PASO COUNTY — Josefina Duran knows both sides of the Rio Grande, here where the river forms the international boundary between Mexico and the U.S.

Regardless of which side of the river she's lived on, Duran has lived without running water.

For most of her 46 years, she grew up in Juárez, Mexico, calling the river the Rio Bravo.

For the last 20 years she has lived in Cochran Estates, a subdivision known as a colonia, in El Paso County, some 15 miles east of the city of El Paso.

In Juárez at least, her family could order water from a big tanker, brought to them free, courtesy of the city government.

Now she pays $900 a year in property taxes, some of it to the El Paso County water district, and still has to pay a truck to bring her family water for bathing and washing dishes. "I thought things would be different here, but the problems are the same," she said in Spanish. "We don't mind paying taxes, but we have no services. The only service we have is electricity. We don't have the other services people have that pay taxes."

Cruz Garcia, Duran's neighbor in Cochran Estates, raised four children and now has five grandchildren in the house she and her husband built nine years ago. It has electricity, but she pays to have the hauled water pumped into a 2,500-gallon tank. Now in the hot summer, the water lasts about a week and a half for short showers, washing clothes and cleaning dishes.

Duran and Garcia are among hundreds of people living in scattered homes among five colonias. They bought the stark, cactus-covered desert land from a developer who told them once enough people purchased lots, they could band together and request water service from the Lower Rio Grande Water District.

More than 20 years later, few can turn on a tap and enjoy flowing water. Instead, they shower at neighbors' houses, buy drinking water at the store or buy it at several kiosks scattered around the communities. Some families have big storage tanks and pay someone to truck water to fill them.

"Most of us were from Juárez. We didn't know the regulations," Duran said. "We weren't from here. Now we understand it is the same politics here as it was in Juárez, the only difference is here it's in English."

Duran pays $40 to have 1,500 gallons of water hauled to a tank near her house. She pumps it inside for the bathroom and washing dishes for herself, her husband and their three children still living at home. It lasts about two weeks, she said. She washes the family's clothes at a laundromat. She buys water at a store for drinking and cooking. "It's difficult because we don't have running water for anything," said Duran, who is a housewife, while her husband works construction. "It makes us want to move, but we don't have the money to do that."

The colonias are an architectural mishmash. Some of the houses are large, two-story structures with fancy iron bar fences surrounding them. Others are drab concrete-block homes or trailers. Most of the yards sport bare dirt with a few scattered flowers and shade trees.

The land where the colonias cropped up are big, flat expanses of Chihuahuan Desert. Lots were split off and sold by various landowners. The land was cheaper than in El Paso, one of the reasons it appealed to immigrants such as Duran.

Duran, Garcia and residents of other colonias claim the landowners told them running water and electricity would become available as more people moved in. Electrical lines were put in, but not the water. "We're still waiting," said Garcia, 52.

The county has tried to find new lots with services where people can move, but many have already built and paid for their homes in the colonias and can't sell them without water.

Theodora Trujillo, an elderly activist who has lobbied to bring services to the colonias, said residents in the El Paso Valley depend on three sources of water: the Mesilla aquifer, El Paso aquifer and the Rio Grande. But tapping into the water takes money.

"These communities have worked for years to have water," Trujillo said. "It is very expensive for these colonias."

A government-funded rural development program is studying possible solutions such as providing an elevated tank at each house and a reverse osmosis treatment system, but all of it takes money.

Garcia said Cochran sits between two other colonias — Lakeway and Agua Dulce — that both have water. Lakeway is served by the Lower Rio Grande Valley water district. Agua Dulce receives water from Horizon City. "They can't decide which district we belong to," Garcia said. "We're in the middle, and no one wants to take care of us."

Duran said last year, someone from Austin came and said they were going to put in a well, a water treatment plant and pipelines. Machinery came out and crews started drilling. Then nothing happened and no one said anything to the families. "Maybe they didn't find any water," she said.

A year after a dozen residents from three of the colonias first met with a reporter to describe their water problems, little had changed.

Duran said when she moved to the U.S. and attained her citizenship, she dreamed of an easier life than in Juárez. "In reality, it is not that much different," she said.

She said she's not angry about what's happened, just resigned. "We're accustomed to doing what we have to do to survive," she said.

Contact Staci Matlock at 470-9843 or smatlock@sfnewmexican.com.