When did obstucting the flow of traffic become the goal rather than a biproduct?

I had occasion to drive up Van Ness Avenue at around 10 in the morning on a work day. Mapquest said it was a 9 minute drive.  While I anticipated traffic, so I knew it was unlikely to be so short, I did not expect it to be quite so bad.

Accidents happen, MUNI buses break down, construction equipment blocks lanes.  All of those things are everyday occurrences.  I am not sure what happened on this day, I could see no reason for the closure, but a single block, in one direction, was closed off.

There was a parking control officer with his little car (what do they call those things anyway?) blocking the far side of the intersection.  So far, so good.  You have three lanes of traffic that needed to turn right into two lanes.  You have cross traffic.  You have a traffic light.  And what was the parking control officer doing?  Nothing!

He is there, why the hell isn't he directing traffic, trying to mitigate the mess he has created.  The only time he moved was when he went over to joke with the MUNI driver who had run a red light to block the intersection for a full three cycles of the traffic lights.

If this were a unique situation, I would say this was just one idiot.   But in my day to day commute in and out of the city I have seen this over and over.  Police and parking control officers on scene, standing around watching the situation get worse and worse, when the simple act of directing traffic would have made an enormous difference in the flow of traffic.  Could they have made traffic flow normally?  Probably not, but they could have eliminated the gridlock.

Years ago, I lived in Anchorage, Alaska.  Power outages, while not widespread, were a reasonably common occurrence for traffic lights.  And almost without fail, someone would pull their car over to the curb, get out a flashlight, and stand in the middle of the intersection directing traffic while the traffic light was out of commission.  I saw that again and again.

In San Francisco, however, it is an exception for even those paid to control traffic on the city streets to get out there and lend a hand.  Now if they are off attending to other duties, I can understand that the inconvenience of a few thousand drivers may not be the highest priority.  But if you are already there. and just standing around, how about showing a little pride?