What happened to the by-laws?

Sir,
The last few days have seen ratepayers grumbling about the poor state of affairs at the municipality, and the events around the emergency number and the control room underscored that. May God ensure that nothing catches fire in this town… We may still be grateful for all this rain.
Rumblings from the suburbs have spawned rumours that people want to go the dispute route. Create an organisation, give it a suitable constitution and have people pay their rates and taxes into a trust account, controlled by a lawyer. Get contractors to do the jobs that are supposed to be done by the municipality, and smother those corrupt fools out of office.
Maybe we can get the kerbs and gutters cleaned before some heavy rain really hits us. The municipality certainly has enough money (and contractors) to upgrade their own parking, but the ratepayers now have to clean their own town?
Makes one wonder what happened to the by-laws that were introduced with such clamour?
Irate Ratepayer