"This is a fire protection system, and for some fire departments the notion that they're there to put out the fires may be more deeply ingrown than is obvious."

Good point. Fire departments do a great deal of volunteer work in terms of making sure people have smoke alarms, escape plans, advice that brush be cut back from the house/structure at urban/rural interfaces, etc. However, it's not the departments job to go replace batteries in alarms or cut the brush, etc.