WELCOME TO PIMA COUNTY CULTURAL RESOURCES
AND HISTORIC PRESERVATION!

Pima County is rich in history, cultural diversity, living traditions, and regional character, all of which define our collective cultural heritage and community identity. These qualities reside where our Native American, Spanish Colonial, Mexican, and American traditions intersect with the natural environment to create a unique, multi-storied cultural landscape. The Pima County Cultural Resources & Historic Preservation Office honors this heritage by working to preserve our cultural and historical resources. Cultural and historical resources are those places that are created by and reflect upon the people who have lived for thousands of years in what is today Pima County, including ancestral Native American sites, historic Spanish colonial, Mexican, and Euroamerican sites, traditional cultural places, historic buildings, districts, objects, living traditions, and working landscapes.

Cultural and Historical Resources

Pima County is committed to the protection, conservation, and preservation of cultural and historical resources to benefit its citizens of today and to preserve this rich heritage for its citizens of tommorow. The citizens of Pima County have long recognized the value of preserving their cultural resources. Since the 1970s, Pima County has taken an active position in protecting our cultural and historical sites through preservation policies, regional conservation, land-use planning, ordinances, and recently with historic preservation bonds. All of these efforts have received considerable public support.

Humans have continuously occupied Pima County for the past 12,000 years, from the end of the last Ice Age to the present day. While only 12 percent of the land base has been formally investigated, today there are more than 8,595 recorded archaeological and historical properties in Pima County. These properties include more than 4,075 historic buildings and other structures and more than 4,520 prehistoric and historic archaeological sites. Most common among the prehistoric sites are those dating to the period from A.D. 750 to1450 during which the Hohokam people occupied central and southern Arizona. Most of Pima County’s recorded historic buildings are within the Tucson city limits. In general, these represent settlement during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries when Tucson emerged from its origins as a fortified village and grew to be a major metropolitan center.

Historic Summary of Pima County (PDF)

The Santa Cruz Valley is a unique and diverse watershed in the southwestern United States, encompassing a mosaic of cultures and history. The concept of a Santa Cruz Valley National Heritage Area has been created by a partnership of local interests that have a stake in the future of the region.

Visit their web site below:

http://www.santacruzheritage.org

CULTURAL RESOURCES & HISTORIC PRESERVATION OFFICE
PIMA COUNTY PUBLIC WORKS CENTER
201 N. STONE AVENUE, 6TH FL.
TUCSON, ARIZONA 85701-1207
PHONE: (520) 740-6451
FAX: (520) 243-1610