I share your wariness of government picking the winners, and posit that this Workforce Homes program appears to be maybe a slightly cleverer version of state-imposed price control, which does not escape the core fact that the in-group (those who qualify for the program) gets below-market price housing at the expense of the out-group (those who don't qualify for whatever reason) who either must bid higher than they would have without this program or are priced out entirely. And if belonging to a "disadvantaged group" is one of the qualification criteria, then I'm afraid that the underlying economic facts may exacerbate tensions along racial lines.
That said, this is only one person's opinion from thousands of miles away; and I can only say that I'm jealous of what must be the view from your window. :-)
It's code for maintaining low density. (Historically, and still in some places, it codes for race, too.)
Combined with supply restrictions, low density requirements mean (a) skyrocketing prices, (b) rationing or (c) more density. A lot of the conversation has been focussed on (c), which I approve of in e.g. Cupertino, where I grew up. (Turning suburbia into a city solely impacts human concerns in a way paving over nature does not.) But (b) might have more angles to it than the traditional public housing model. (I've also been a favor of public housing built to own, where the government e.g. builds housing and sells it to first-time home buyers at a subsidized price. This not only builds wealth and avoids the patronage problem, it also creates mixed-income housing of the type that's less noxious to NIMBY's than solely low-income housing.)
The town doesn't want to be all remote workers, or remote workers and $100 cocktails because that's what it costs to keep a bartender. Remote workers (like me) are welcome. We must simply pay market rate, versus having dedicated supply. This seems fair given, as remote workers, we have more choice with respect to which housing market we descend upon.
Same. I live in Wyoming. Our county has "workforce housing." It's exclusively for sale or rent to workers in the local area. (Versus remote workers or holidayers.)
I'm not advocating for this policy, though I think it's brilliant. But it highlights our desire, perhaps need, for non-market demand-side moderation. We presently put all the non-market moderation on the supply side. From the meaningful, like capacity, design and environmental reviews, to the useless: neighborhood bitching sessions and meaningless permits from every politician who needs petitions signed.
Instead, the Teton model points to a hybrid approach. Less regulation on the supply side. But more non-market requirements on the demand side. One approach is ring-fenced supply for groups the community deems desirable, like critical workers, disadvantaged groups, et cetera. We have good reason to be wary of this government-picking-the-winners approach. But if we want to maintain a community feel and keep housing affordable, the solution must be rationing.
Centralized rationing leads to patronage. (See New York City.) De-centralised rationing, where supply is held back for certain groups who have a market to themselves, looks more resilient. The process of choosing who's in the non-market group and how much of the market they get to themselves will be fraught. But it looks more plausible than convincing Atherton to build sky-rises or homeowners to accept rent and price regulation.