All districts
Detached accessory dwelling units are permitted where the underlying district's use table marks accessory dwelling unit as accessory (A), which includes the A-1 through R1-9-family single-family districts, subject to: compliance with the district's yard and intensity standards (Sec. 4.7), total square footage (including attached garage and covered patios) capped at 50 percent of the primary structure's under-roof area, one accessory dwelling unit per lot maximum, and required parking located on the same lot (Sec. 6.1.D). Attached ADUs approved under the Town's 2024 text amendment (Ordinance 850-24, adopted unanimously November 6, 2024, in response to Arizona HB2720 / A.R.S. Sec. 9-461.18) must sit within the same building envelope as the home (maximum 30 feet in height per district), cannot encroach into side or rear setbacks, and are capped at 75 percent of the primary home's habitable living area or 1,000 square feet, whichever is less; this was stated on the record by Town planning staff at the adoption hearing, not just summarized secondhand (Town Council meeting minutes, November 6, 2024, agenda item 10.B). Arizona HB2720's actual statutory text (A.R.S. Sec. 9-461.18.A) requires "a municipality with a population of more than seventy-five thousand persons" to allow one attached and one detached ADU by right on every single-family lot (plus a third detached ADU on lots an acre or larger where one unit is income-restricted), capped at 75 percent of gross floor area or 1,000 square feet, whichever is less; a municipality that fails to adopt conforming regulations by January 1, 2025 must instead allow ADUs "on all lots or parcels zoned for residential use...without limits" (Sec. 9-461.18.F). HB2720 does not itself define how "population" is measured. Town planning staff stated at the November 6, 2024 hearing that "in the last census Queen Creek does not meet the threshold but the text amendment says in 2030 at the next census the Town will comply with those provisions," and Queen Creek's official 2020 census population was 59,519 (below 75,000), even though current-year population estimates (roughly 84,000-95,000 depending on source) exceed it. Pegging "population" to the most recent decennial census, rather than to a mid-decade estimate, is the general convention elsewhere in Arizona municipal law, so the Town's position has a real factual basis and is not simply a stall, but it is not the only possible reading of HB2720's text, and no Arizona court decision, attorney general opinion, or further legislative amendment settling the question was found. Exact-figure review-gated: confirm the current adopted ADU standard, including whether the two-ADU-by-right and third-ADU-on-acre-plus-lots rules of HB2720 are now in force, directly with Development Services (480-358-3092) before relying on either the pre-2024 or the 850-24 figures above.