[fishtoaster]

One role of representative democracy (vs direct democracy) is to balance competing desires. Eg everyone wants good roads, but no one wants higher taxes. If you allow people to directly vote on each, people vote for higher costs and less revenue. So instead, we elect representatives to take a mix of popular (give us things) and unpopular (take things from us to pay for those things) positions at the same time.

Housing policy is the same thing. People widely support "cheaper housing" as a concept. If you magically halved the cost of all houses in the bay area, a lot of people would jump for joy and move to larger/nicer houses. On the other hand, roundly reject the things necessary to accomplish that - eg big housing complexes next door to them. It's the role of elected representatives to balance those desires.

That's where the moral authority to override a specific local desire comes from.