In the town where I once lived, people used to leave the volunteer fire department property in their wills. Over the decades, the property became so valuable that the department now owns land worth millions of dollars, and collects huge rents. They have beautiful, expensive trucks and throw great parties.
A lot of volunteer fire departments in Iowa used to double as social clubs that consumed a lot of alcohol and raised the local divorce rate. They still tend to be "clubby," but with creeping FEMA-zation, they are increasingly more regimented and regulated, as well as "credentialized" to FedGov standards.
(The Third Reich nationalized fire departments into the Feuerwehr. Not a great precedent.)