That's sort of what I'm wondering. Do they actually mean nationalizing or did they just say that because there's not a word for local public ownership.
Which is weird because it's actually a fairly common thing. There should be a word for it. I mean maybe there is but I don't know it.
Edit: I looked it up and it seems like the verb in this case would be to municipalize, as you said. This word seems to be very rarely used but if that's what they meant there is a term for it.