The central issue in SF really is just that all the stakeholders with any power whatsoever are highly incentivized to minimize change, because most of the voting and bribery base (I mean, political donation base) is manically obsessed with keeping housing prices as high as possible, so every department in every place in government is designed to slow and reject permits as much as possible. The incentives have been there so long that it's seeped into appointed bureaucrats in every place in local government, so even if you vote for someone staunchly anti-obstruction, it would take years of intense work to get the rot out of the entire system, longer than a single election cycle for sure.

Plus, the people who would vote less obstructionist policies often are the ones who live out in Oakland or something and commute in to work, and thus can't vote on the SF policies, so those people get shoved out even more by the high costs. It's a vicious cycle and there's probably no answer to it besides state/federal intervention to force lack of obstruction (e.g. making certain zoning requirements like "single family home only" illegal). For now, the incentives of local voters are stacked in the "we'll take literal shit on the streets if it means higher housing prices" camp.