E.g. it may be the case that rent control and other roadblocks increase the cost of housing in the long run (bad for anyone new moving to the Bay Area), but it certainly benefits the current occupants of rent-controlled housing.
That's one reason to be slightly skeptical of the label 'minority' organizations—it's unclear whether all minorities have the same interests at stake. In particular, minorities who currently live in below-market cost housing have markedly different expected payoff from a change in policy than minorities who currently live outside of the city.
Certainly, good politics and making nice can smooth over some amount of disagreement, but is there really a mechanism right now that could make everyone better off?
I, too, would like to live in a world where:
- Minorities and/or lower income people aren't priced out of the city
- ... and will have enough units to live in in the future
- and widespread construction so tech workers or other immigrants have cheaper rent
- the character of our neighborhoods aren't gentrified away
- and it isn't too expensive to build
...but experience as engineers tells us that there is always a compromise to be made when you ask for everything. The political fight here is who is will end up compromising, and how much.
While I support the Yimby approach the truth is it is largely led by upper middle class white people. To get things done in politics, you don't to have the best argument, you need to have the best consensus of citizens and $$ supporting you. The yimby org doesn't realize this - they think they can steam roll over minority groups to get things done, but frankly they need to a better job building bridges with these groups. This is how politics work.