I’m always amazed that owners have little to no idea of the rules of strata. (Here I’m not commenting on the particular circumstances of the OP which no one knows and are not necessary to know.)
While strata legislation isn’t perfect it does set out what needs to be done and is easy to read. In any case it’s the first point of call before reading the by-laws which could be considered as fine-tuning for a particular scheme. By-laws don’t replace or override legislation.
Probably the biggest issue with legislation is that it doesn’t deal with the power trips of committtees and strata managers. If the OP’s scheme is one of those clicky ones where politics overrides legislation and even commonsense then I can understand a hesitency to seek approval. The reality however is that it will come back to bite someone just maybe not today.
If you are fortunate to live in a decent and reasonable scheme then you should obtain that by-law. It’s a very easy process costing a few hundred dollars (at most) and a few hours of your time. It will buy you a lot of peace of mind. 🙂