The people who come in with skill in governance and are in a highly-visible local government like SF rapidly move up and out of local government.
For that matter, term limits mean they move out even if they don't move up.
> I identify as a liberal democrat, it makes me sad that a city that has been under the control of my preferred political ideology for decades is so completely dysfunctional.
SF hasn't been under liberal democratic control for decades (at least by any single coherent definition of “liberal democrat”, which has two opposed uses—it can refer either to the center-right neoliberal or center-left progressive faction of the party, and the two have been back and forth in SF.)
Some people say that the definition of insanity is to keep doing the same thing in the same way, while expecting different results.
However in America I only get to vote for one of two sides and I still think mine is the lesser of two evils.
The $2.2B shiny new Transbay Terminal shuts down after less than 2 months? The Chinatown subway boondoggle? The Eastern Span going from $250M to $6.5B and still having seriously troubling defects? Where are the adults in charge?
Then you have Reds and Blues, I’m not going to dignify them by referring to them by what they consider themselves to be because their “leadership” are both a bunch of filthy liars. When the Blues control the national government, the Reds are all about them States’ Rights. When the Reds control the national government, it is up to the Blues to resist! That is to say, there isn’t a coherent political ideology to be found here.
So zoom back in to San Francisco for a bit, and the controlling ideology isn’t one singular ideology, it’s a Board of Supervisors that is largely working for the benefit of property owners and corporate interests. The progressives have done more to shore up property values and the moderates have done more to attract and retain businesses. Neither of them gives a damn about large scale infrastructure. Neither of them gives a damn if we who are from SF actually get to make a life here.
The controlling interests are in no way completely dysfunctional, they are accomplishing their objectives by making it more difficult to actually increase residential density or expand infrastructure to accommodate the influx of residents.
Sacramento has a similar only slightly more diverse set of players, and most California cities, particularly around the Bay, are playing the same game of shoring up property values while trying to attract businesses. Actual residents get left out in the cold, or convinces to vote one way or the other because this or that faction is slightly more agreeable than this one over here, and are willing to throw a few bones their way on some generally fairly unimportant issues.
We spend more time debating the merits of plastic straws or selling fur than we do figuring out how to run safe needle exchanges to keep needles out of the streets, staff and clean some public restrooms with showers to keep piss and shit out of the streets and build some damn apartments to keep people out of the streets. Ironically the Board of Supervisors has done a bang up job of keeping scooters out of the sidewalks in the most ham fisted manner they could muster.
We can have high quality nuanced debates all we want about whatever bourgeois bullshit comes down the sewer, but we can’t get behind the simple idea of building the infrastructure we actually need so kids who grow up here, their schoolteachers, and our neighbors can find an affordable place to live here in this damnable city. Maybe our ideologies aren’t the issue here, maybe it’s just that We the People actually suck.
I identify as a liberal democrat, it makes me sad that a city that has been under the control of my preferred political ideology for decades is so completely dysfunctional.
It makes me wonder if there just aren't enough people who share my values but actually have skill in governance.