Bureaucracy at its Finest?

One of the pieces of paper sitting on my desk for the last month or two requiring my attention was a permit application from the city of Charlotte for the alarm we recently had installed. I finally got around to taking a look at it today. It informed me that the city of Charlotte requires all alarms to be registered and that a valid permit number was required in order to receive police response to an alarm.

Really? So like, this is what would happen if someone walked into the house brandishing a gun at me right now and I hit the Panic button on the alarm?

[ME]: HEEEEEEEEELP!!!!!!!!!!
[ALARM COMPANY GUY]: We're sending the police right away! Oh wait... I don't seem to have your permit number on file... did you send in your paperwork?
[ME]: What? HEEEEEEELP!!!!!!!!!!!
[ALARM COMPANY GUY]: Do you think you could fax that over real quick...?

Okay, that is probably not what would happen. (I hope!)

But just the same, I put the permit application in the mail just now...