Library
The Sun City Oro Valley Library is a friendly, welcoming, and lively place where you can browse our large collection of books and videos, chat with friends, and enjoy yourself. You can find a good biography, identify local birds, locate hiking trails, read the latest research on health, see a hot new movie, or read the latest novel by your favorite author. We would love to show you how to use our new online catalog. Stop by soon!
| Hours | Location |
|---|---|
| Click Here for Hours |
1565 E Rancho Vistoso Blvd. Phone: 520-917-8064 |
Collection
Did you know that your HOA fees do not cover the purchase of library books and that all our funds to purchase new books and other materials come from the FOL, the SCV Community Foundation, the ILR, and our patrons? Thanks to all these hardworking people our collection holds about 15,000 items, including close to 9000 cataloged books, videos and audio books, 5000 cataloged paperbacks, a small children’s section, hundreds of magazines and puzzles, and hundreds more items in a sale section. You can find hardcover and paperback fiction and nonfiction, audiobooks in both CD and MP3 CD formats, and movies, documentaries, and television series on DVD. We are very proud of our large and growing selection of large print books. You will find books written by SCOV residents shelved in a section of their own, and a children’s corner stocked with books and movies for entertaining visiting grandchildren.
The librarian takes note of what authors, titles, genres and subjects are popular with our patrons when purchasing new books and videos, keeping the collection fresh. Residents are invited to recommend purchases on a “Wish List” kept in the library, and over half of these titles are placed on our shelves. With a finite amount of space, and new titles competing with old titles, the shelves are frequently culled to make way for best sellers, and hot new movies and television series. You won’t find many books on our hardback shelves that were published more than five or six years ago, and the same goes for movies. Books and videos pulled from our shelves are put up for sale in order to earn money to purchase new titles. Items that don’t sell are donated to the Oro Valley Public Library, the Tucson VA Hospital, and other worthy groups.
Is there a book or movie you’d like to see in our library? Put it on our Wish List!
Library Media Sale
Library Media Sale Prices:
| Hardbacks (fiction and Nonfiction) | $4.00 |
| Small Paperbacks | $1.00 |
| Large Paperbacks | $2.00 |
| Videos | $1.00 |
| Audio Book CDs | $1.00 |
Besides having the best prices on used books and videos in town, the library offers deeply discounted specials for holidays and special occasions!
History
It all started in 1988 with a set of cookbooks, thirty-five paperbacks, and a group of extraordinarily dedicated residents with a vision. The result was the Sun City Oro Valley Library—a recreational library with an outstanding collection tailored to the tastes of our population. Since its founding, the library has been housed in five locations, beginning with a table in what is now the Gift Shop. It has grown over the years and is now housed in a beautiful space in the Welcome Center, where computerized circulation and an online catalog have replaced the old way of doing things. Today there are approximately 15,000 items in our collection, making it the size of a small public library.
The Library Technology and Facility Update Project, completed in August 2015, was made possible thanks to a donation from the ILR (Institute of Learning in Retirement), fundraising efforts of the FOL (Friends of the Library), and the time and talent of members of the Woodworking Club, as well as the many hard-working library volunteers. From the early days of checking out books based on the honor system, to recording unit/lot and phone numbers on library cards, to today’s state-of-the-art online circulation system, the library has earned a place as one of the most-used (and beloved) amenities in Sun City.
