Here's a stat that should make your blood boil: almost no housing is getting built in San Francisco. In a city where the median rent still hovers at levels that would make most Americans weep, where teachers and nurses commute two hours each way, and where "affordable" is a word used almost exclusively in irony — we still can't figure out how to put up new buildings.

Now there's a new proposal on the table that, we're told, could change everything. Forgive us if we've heard that one before.

The fundamental problem isn't a mystery. It's not geology. It's not a lack of demand. It's not that developers have forgotten how to pour concrete. It's that San Francisco has built one of the most Byzantine, expensive, and politically weaponized permitting processes in the country. Every new project runs a gauntlet of environmental reviews, neighborhood objections, design reviews, appeals, more appeals, and the occasional supervisorial grandstand — all before a single shovel hits dirt.

The result? Projects that pencil out in Houston, Austin, or even Los Angeles simply don't pencil out here. Developers look at the timeline, look at the carrying costs, and walk away. The ones who stay either build luxury units (because only luxury margins can absorb the regulatory overhead) or rely on massive public subsidies. Neither outcome helps the barista trying to stay in the Sunset.

Any serious reform needs to do three things: dramatically shorten approval timelines, reduce the number of discretionary reviews that let politics override planning, and stop treating density like a four-letter word. If this latest proposal accomplishes even one of those, it'll be worth watching.

But let's be honest about the track record. San Francisco has a remarkable ability to study problems, commission reports, hold hearings, pass resolutions, and then do absolutely nothing. We've declared housing emergencies before. We've streamlined processes before — on paper. And yet here we are, in 2025, writing the same story.

The math is simple: more housing means lower prices. The politics, unfortunately, are anything but. Until City Hall decides that actually building homes matters more than preserving every neighborhood veto point, proposals will keep coming — and housing won't.