A lot of posts are focusing on the Triage queue, but that is really only one piece of the larger problem. The real issue here is that posts are getting stuck in H&I and there is no "by design" mechanism to remove those that may not actually belong there. So there are 2 options:
- Make it impossible for posts to be incorrectly sent from Triage to H&I (not realistic)
- Add a mechanism to H&I that allows hopeless posts to be removed (easily implemented)
The only way to implement the first option is to completely remove the Requires Editing button from Triage, but doing that obviates the need for H&I since it's the only ingress point for that queue. No amount of instruction / warning / review-ban / rep requirement is going to be able to completely prevent this problem.1
So that leaves the second option: add a check valve to H&I so these posts can be removed without moderator intervention. How about just adding Unsalvageable as an option in H&I, similar to Triage? There are lots of good ways to implement it that would both remove the burden from the moderators and improve the quality of the reviews without punishing reviewers (send it back to Triage... notify the original reviewers... send it to users with high scores for the applied tags... make Sam Liew fix it (wait not that one)).
1: I am not implying that these options should therefore not be considered; they will absolutely help. What I am asserting is that no combination of "soft interventions" will ever be 100% successful here.