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He decided to live where they have a volunteer fire department. And I'm sure he was happy to pay less in taxes for it. Well he got what he paid for.

He pays taxes for people to misdirect his call, send the wrong people, and have them wait there and do nothing for a while before calling the right people?

In the Baltimore Metro area this would not happen. Baltimore City and the 5 surrounding counties all have mutual aid agreements. Ambulance and Fire units cross political boundries daily. There are numerous times when district "A" ambo is in district "B"s territory more than district "B"s ambo is. This is the case in many, many parts of the country also.

There are problems with it, however. Larger cities continue to make cuts to their emergency services. The counties that surround the larger cities are often providing emergency services to the larger cities with very little return. Not that the big cities refuse, it is that they do not have the available units. Oftentimes the county's $$$$ for emergency services is being spent in the big cities.

I could not imagine this happening where I live - I am a firefighter in the Baltimore area. The vollys help the career services and the career services help the vollys. It happens all day long, everyday.