The City Planning Department is drafting an accessory dwelling units (ADUs) law that works for the city and is best for the city and pays less attention to state requirements for ADUs enacted by the legislature earlier this year.

According to City Planning Director Kevin Walker, the city planners had been working hard to make the new city ADU law comply with HB 1152, a state law setting state standards for ADUs erected in single-family zones in various Colorado cities, including Colorado Springs.

The idea now is to write the new ADU code the way the city of Colorado Springs wants it — and then see how the state government responds.

The state could overlook and ignore the city’s actions — or state officials could turn to the and state courts to force state regulations on ADUs in single-family zones in Colorado Springs.

But it may be that the state courts will rule that ADUs are a matter of local concern, and not a state concern, and thereby declare the state action unconstitutional and let the Colorado Springs law stand.

Planning Director Walker summed up the Colorado Springs position this way:

“We will work to write a new ADU law that fits the needs of Colorado Springs. We will also strive to align our law with state law. But in cases of conflict, Colorado Springs will come first.”

A detached accessory dwelling unit is a separate home from the main home built in the backyard on a single-family lot. Originally intended for relatives, such as grown children or an aging grandmother, ADUs can be rented to separate families.

ADUs in neighborhoods that are zoned single-family are controversial.

When rented to a separate family or a separate individual, ADUs violate the spirit of single-family zoning.

Volunteer neighborhood associations here have been working and arguing to reduce the unsalutary effects of ADUs by limiting by law their size (1,000 square feet or less), their height (16 feet or one story high), and the number of bedrooms (two or three bedrooms only).

The Colorado Springs Planning Department is currently working to negotiate a compromise on exactly what limits will be placed on ADUs by city law.

One action has been assured. State law does not allow a proposed ADU to be appealed by adjacent homeowners to the City Council. But such an appeal process will be put in place in Colorado Springs.

Another area of possible conflict between the Colorado law and Colorado Springs is required off-street parking.

The state law enacted earlier in the year banned off-street parking requirements for ADUs. There is strong support in Colorado Springs for requiring at least one off-street parking space for each proposed new ADU.

Some of the volunteer neighborhood associations claim the ADU issue is so vital to the interests of single-family zoned neighborhoods that more research is required. They want the issue postponed until after the upcoming April City Council elections.

The city plan, however, is to get the proposed Colorado Springs ADU ordinance before the City Council by Feb. 25 and have it enacted into law before the elections.

Lobbying hard for limits on ADUs in single-family zones is the Historic Neighborhoods Partnership (HNP). It represents such well-known neighborhoods as Historic Uptown (north of downtown), Middle Shooks Run, the Old North End, Skyway and others.

These homeowners groups has been gathering information on how other cities in Colorado limit the size and height of ADUs. Here are some of their results:

• Aurora, 800 square feet, 25 feet high

• Boulder, 1,000 square feet, requires off-street parking

• Castle Rock, 800 square feet

• Denver, 1,000 square feet, 1.5 stories high

• Fort Collins, 1,000 square feet, 1.5 stories high

• Lakewood, 1,200 square feet, 16 feet high

The conclusion drawn from the surveys is that limits on the square footage and the height of ADUs are found in active use in various cities throughout the Front Range.

ADUs are supported by interest groups that want to see more affordable housing available to lower income people in Colorado. ADUs can also provide a source of extra income needed by economically challenged homeowners.