Pima County Public Library

Services

The PCPL system offers a variety of services for both children and adults. For children, storytimes are offered, including bilingual storytimes at some library locations. Children can improve their reading skills through our Read to a Dog program. Assistance with homework is also available online, by phone, and at specific library locations. Additional children's activities include El Dia de los Ninos/El Dia de los Libros, and the summer reading program.

PCPL also provides information on clubs, events, and opportunities available to teens. At PCPL, teens can serve as library advocates, participate on an advisory board, and volunteer. Typical teen activities include "MegaMania!!," a manga/anime con, programming and filmmaking classes, gaming, and drawing and poetry contests.

For adults, a wide range of services are available. Libraries host book clubs, computer classes, author visits, English classes, citizenship classes, and assistance looking and applying for jobs.

PCPL provides a wide range of services for the community. Their events are posted on the calendar. Further information is also available on their website.

History

Tucson’s first public library, originally called the Carnegie Free Library, was founded in 1883. The first library building was partially funded by Andrew Carnegie’s campaign to build public libraries in the late 19th century. Carnegie committed to paying up to $25,000 to build a new library on the condition that the City of Tucson supplied a building site and provided $2,000 per year to maintain the library. The Tucson Common Council made good on this deal by passing Resolution Number 20. This resolution earmarked $2,000 per year for library maintenance, and designated a site for the library. The site used constituted a portion of Military Plaza.

Architect Henry Charles Trost was hired to build the new library, which was completed in June 1901. The Carnegie Free Library, administered by the city of Tucson, was located at 200 South 6th Avenue. Initially, the library did not include a children’s room. This area was added after funds were raised in 1924. The library began with 2,000 volumes in 1891, but had grown to over 60,000 in 1942. A new 90,000-square-foot (8,400 m²) facility opened downtown in May 1990. Today, this building is the Joel D. Valdez Main Library.

On January 7, 1957 the name of the Carnegie Free Library was changed to "Tucson Public Library" by the Tucson city council. This name was changed to the Tucson-Pima Public Library in 1990 when Pima County became more involved in the library’s operations. Finally, when Pima County took control of the library system in 2006, the library became the Pima County Public Library.

Today, the system includes 27 libraries throughout Pima County. In addition to its Main and neighborhood branches, it offers a Bookmobile, Books-By-Mail, deposit collections, and a growing number of Virtual Library services online.

Challenge To The Accepted History

On July 8, 2014, in the Arizona Daily Star newspaper, historian David Leighton challenged the accepted history of the public libraries of Tucson:

He wrote that the first known public library in Tucson was the Territorial Library, which had arrived with the territorial government, when Tucson became the capital of the Arizona Territory in 1867. By January 1877, the Territorial Library had 1,900 legal books and 300 non-legal volumes, which could be checked out by the public during regular hours. Soon after, the territorial government moved back to Prescott, Arizona.

In 1879, a group of women in Tucson began the Tucson Library Association, which was a private organization where members paid a subscription fee to help buy the books that they could borrow. In March 1883, they offered to give their whole private collection to the City of Tucson, if the city council would provide a room and other needed items for a free library.

On June 5, 1883, the city council dedicated the second floor of the new city hall for the purpose of a library, but didn't set aside any money to buy things like book shelves, furniture, etc. It wasn't until July 6, 1886, after money was raised for the needed items, that the Tucson Public Library first opened its doors.

In 1899, philanthropist Andrew Carnegie offered $25,000 to build a public library building in Tucson, if the city council would set aside land and guarantee a fund of $2,000 a year for its upkeep. The city council passed Resolution #20 in 1899, which provided land that was part of the Military Plaza for the site and set up the Library Fund. The new Carnegie Free Library opened in 1901 and the original Tucson Public Library faded into history.

Controversies

In 2012, the Tucson Unit of the National Writers Union (NWU) publicly raised objections to the library's collection development policy. In an op-ed piece published in the Tucson Weekly's July 5 edition ("The Pima County Public Library Must Stop Getting Rid of Our Books"), the NWU pointed out that PCPL ranks 28th, next to last, in the number of printed materials per resident in public libraries serving comparable populations, despite that in the same Institute of Museum and Library Services survey the library ranked sixteenth in the amount of money it spent on printed materials per resident. Because it discards books so aggressively, the op-ed piece continued, the library has a sub-par collection of books even though it spends enough money to have a much better quality collection.

In its reply to the piece, the PCPL stated that its collection development policy is geared toward "making room on the shelves for high-demand and popular books and materials in other formats" and pointed out that library circulation had increased from 6.2 million items in 2006 to more than 7.5 million items in 2010. It also stated that readers have the possibility of getting books they want via inter-library loan services or by requesting that the library order the book.

In 2014, KVOA News did two special reports on the library. The first of these highlighted how the library was forced to supplement its standard security service with off-duty officers from the Tucson Police Department. This was done to provide additional security at three of the library branches in which an unusually high number of incidents, ranging from fights to domestic disputes, had taken place.

The second KVOA News report focused on how "hundreds of thousands of dollars in inventory is going missing from the libraries and nobody seems to know why," and how the library, though spending 750,000 dollars a year on security, is not particularly focused on securing or protecting the books, DVDs and CDs in its collection.

Libraries