Lots of people walk by your sidewalk every day, and to your frustration more than a few leave their pet’s droppings in your yard. Imagine you have a sidewalk over your property. Instead of one person saying to another, “hey, do you think you could fix this?” and a chance to say, “yeah” or “I’d love to but…” now it’s some anonymous party leveraging the power of government to compel action without any chance of dialogue. Also, by inserting extra parties into the process, communication is lost and the whole process becomes more hostile. But just like in homeowner’s associations, invariably some small number of people will use their new-found power of complaint to brow-beat those they dislike with a fusillade of only-enforced-when-someone-complained infractions. Sidewalks ought to be usable (although they are a public resource and should be maintained with public funds, not have that burden foisted upon the nearest private party). I have mixed feelings about tools that encourage complaints about poorly-enforced regulations.