Growing up in Kenya, my dad was a contractor and no one would maintain our neighbor hood streets/area. He started a Neighbor hood pool, and got all the maintenance done himself from potholes, street lamps, adding speed bumps for the kids, landscaping etc... City never came and said anything other than good job, moving to Canada we had a hard time adjusting to all the bureaucracy even if your intentions are right, they find a way to make them wrong. People got resourceful, because taxes did squat there.
As an Architecture student in Ottawa, I saw how much time and money is spent analyzing simple things going around in circles, parliament building being one. In some areas they decided to seal stone for whatever reason that has survived decades untouched, sealing stone doesn't let it breathe thus making it brittle, they spent more going in an unsealing it, starting a whole new "renovations" project.
