Abstract
The Bob Coffin Political Papers (approximately 1861-2021) document the political career of independent Democrat Bob Coffin who served in the Nevada Assembly, State Senate, and Las Vegas City Council from 1983 to 2019. Collection materials primarily consist of legislative research files associated with Coffin's committee assignments. City Council records in this collection include budget files, constituent concerns, and city project files. The collection also includes election materials used for Coffin's political campaigns and include posters, mailers, as well as newspaper clippings and information on Coffin's opponents.
Finding Aid PDF
Date
Extent
Related People/Corporations
Scope and Contents Note
The Bob Coffin Political Papers (approximately 1861-2021) document the political career of independent Democrat Bob Coffin who served in the Nevada Assembly, State Senate, and Las Vegas City Council from 1983 to 2019. Collection materials primarily consist of legislative research files associated with Coffin's committee assignments including the taxation, finance, and natural resources committees. Other significant topics related to Coffin's legislative career include marijuana legalization, prostitution tax, water resource issues, and the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository. City council records in this collection include budget files, constituent concerns, and city project files. City council materials include records regarding development of the Badlands Golf Course and establishment of the East Las Vegas Library. The collection also includes election materials used for Coffin's political campaigns and include posters, mailers, as well as newspaper clippings and information on Coffin's opponents.
Access Note
Collection is open for research. Arrangements must be made in advance to access digital files. Where use copies do not exist, production of use copies is required before access will be granted; this may delay research requests. Please contact UNLV Special Collections and Archives for additional information.
Publication Rights
Materials in this collection may be protected by copyrights and other rights. See Reproductions and Use on the UNLV Special Collections and Archives website for more information about reproductions and permissions to publish.
Arrangement
Materials are organized loosely by topic.
Biographical / Historical Note
Nevada politician James Robert "Bob" Coffin was born on October 7, 1942 in Anaheim, California and grew up in Las Vegas, Nevada where he graduated from Bishop Gorman High School and obtained his B.S. in Accounting and Business Administration from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Coffin, an independent Democrat, served the state of Nevada as an elected official for thirty-six years. He was first a member of the Nevada Assembly from 1983 to 1985 and then elected to the Nevada Senate in 1987, a position he served until 2011. As a member of the Nevada Legislature, Coffin was a member of various committees including the Senate Committees on Finance, Natural Resources, Taxation, and Transportation. He served as Chairman of the Senate Committee on Taxation and the Legislation Commission's Information Technology Subcommittee.
In 2011, Coffin was elected to the Las Vegas City Council representing Ward 3, an area that includes downtown Las Vegas and the Arts District. As a councilperson, Coffin worked on issues such as homelessness, housing development, and establishing a branch of the Las Vegas-Clark County Library District on the east side of Ward 3 off of Bonanza Road. He retired from City Council and politics in 2019. Coffin has been commemorated for his work as a public servant of Las Vegas and Nevada by community organizations such as the Young Democrats of Nevada, the Latin Chamber of Commerce, the Hispanic Business and Professional Women of Las Vegas, and the Nevada Women's Political Caucus.
Sources:
"Senator Bob Coffin," Nevada Legislature, Accessed January 6, 2022. https://www.leg.state.nv.us/73rd/legislators/senators/coffin.cfm.
Totten, Kristy, "Bob Coffin, Post City Council: Sleeping In, Wearing Shorts, Fighting for the Homeless," Nevada Public Radio, July 10, 2019. https://knpr.org/knpr/2019-07/bob-coffin-post-city-council-sleeping-wearing-shorts-fighting-homeless.
Preferred Citation
Bob Coffin Political Papers, approximately 1861-2021. MS-01054. Special Collections and Archives, University Libraries, University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Las Vegas, Nevada.
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Acquisition Note
Materials were donated by Bob Coffin in 2021; accession number 2021-063.
Processing Note
These records are unprocessed. In 2021, Paola Landaverde, Jessica Fernando, Jose Andre Guevara, and Tammi Kim reboxed the materials and created a rough box-level inventory. Tammi Kim also transferred files off of digital media and subsequently created the finding aid in ArchivesSpace. Digital video files of Nevada senate hearings produced by the Research Division of the Nevada Legislative Counsel are presented in an inaccessible proprietary format and were not transferred off of the original optical discs but remain described in the inventory.