North Providence firefighters at the Mineral Spring Avenue headquarters had just finished lunch when the call came in about a child locked inside a car. They freed the youngster, who was no worse for wear, in short order.

The Providence Journal / Frieda Squires

NORTH PROVIDENCE — It’s late morning in the firehouse on Mineral Spring Avenue. Almost time for lunch.

“We’re trying to figure out what we’re going to do,” says Capt. Stephen M. L’Heureux, the commander at Station 1. “We’re right on the fence, whether to go shopping, or order out. Eleven o’clock is a critical hour.”

The concept of the hearty firehouse meal, eaten family style around a table, has long been associated with life in the fire service, a trapping that’s just as clichéd as the loyal Dalmatian and the shiny brass pole. But in this town, the tradition has helped to sour relations between local firefighters and Mayor Charles A. Lombardi.

Last year, Lombardi accused firefighters of “abusing” their privilege to make on-duty food purchases by frequenting sandwich and coffee shops too often and by doing personal errands around town while on duty. He ordered “a lockdown,” confining on-duty personnel to their stations between calls and keeping them from frequenting supermarkets and eateries. In February, when the firefighters union took Lombardi to Superior Court and challenged his ability to lay off firefighters to cut costs, the union’s lawyers raised the lockdown issue.

They negotiated an agreement that allows each of the town’s four firehouses to send one company and one of its trucks up to one hour to shop for groceries two times per day, once on the 10-hour day shift and again on the 14-hour night shift.

Previously, Lombardi had said he would not allow such shopping to continue after June 30, but he has decided to let it go on. He says he’ll impose a lockdown again if he catches firefighters abusing the privilege.

For the time being, each firehouse can continue to send a fire truck to local markets to shop for ingredients.

When a call comes in, the firefighters abort their shopping mission to respond. The process is so common that the markets have a procedure for storing the contents of the firefighters’ grocery baskets after they dash away from the checkout line.

“This is not unique to this town,” says Fire Chief Alfred F. Bertoncini. “This is done everywhere.”

The fire stations lack the ability to store, refrigerate and organize enough food to sustain each group of firefighters through its rotation, two day shifts followed by two nights, Bertoncini says, adding that having each firefighter show up each shift with a prepared meal isn’t feasible either.

“They don’t know what they’re going to eat from one day to the next,” he says.

Fire departments handle mealtime differently around the state, according to Providence Fire Chief George S. Farrell, who is president of the Rhode Island Fire Chiefs’ Association.

Providence firefighters may stop for food while returning to the station after a call, but they cannot leave their stations for the specific purpose of shopping, Farrell said.

“That’s an absolute,” he said.

For now, Lombardi is allowing the practice in North Providence even though he dislikes it.

“In my heart,” he says, “I don’t think they should be going to the supermarket at all.”

“They can use Peapod,” he says, referring to the Stop & Shop service that makes grocery deliveries.

The North Providence firefighters union president, John Silva, says firefighters will follow the guidelines they’ve been given.

“I don’t think we’ve ever abused our right to take the trucks and go to the store,” he says. “I have never seen it.”

ON THIS MORNING, Captain L’Heureux, a veteran with gray hair and an infectious smile, feels like homemade sausage and peppers. At the station, the consensus for sausages — and Tater Tots — emerges next to the town’s ladder truck. Each of the 10 firefighters chips in $8.

That’s a little too much cash for the cook, said firefighter George Grande. “Eight dollars for sausage?”

“George you want us to pay for you?” L’Heureux asks.

“I’m on a fixed income over here,” says Grande, who likes to keep meals to $5. Engine 1, a three-man group, is elected for shopping duty. They mount up as L’Heureux, still happy about the idea of grilled sausages, yells out to the team.

“Try to be good,” he says, grinning. “Be nice … in the market. Don’t argue too much.”

“Let’s go,” someone says as the engine starts. “We’ve only got an hour.”

Engine 1 is a 1995 pumper that weighs about 30,000 pounds and burns about a gallon of diesel every five miles.

Leaving the station around 11:15 a.m., the machine lumbers toward Shore’s Fresh Food Market. It takes about 10 minutes to make the 1.2-mile trip in bumper-to-bumper traffic on Mineral Spring Avenue.

Firefighter Benjamin Maimoni parks the behemoth out of the way and heads into Shore’s with firefighter Giuseppe Ruggieri. Lt. Richard J. Parenteau hangs out in the bright red truck, which has the phrase “In the heat of it all” stenciled on each side in gold letters.

Inside the market, the firefighters buy about $33 worth of mild and hot sausage. They also clean out the bin of French Parisian loafs. Maimoni carefully picks out the peppers and finds the Tater Tots. Altogether, the bill comes to about $76.

The firefighters figure they spend $150 to $200 per day, or $1,500 to $2,000 per week at local markets.

It’s about 11:45 when the pumper backs into the firehouse. The groceries are rushed to the kitchen where Grande and his helpers attack the food like a 10-alarm fire, hastily unpacking the sausage and spreading the Tater Tots on a metal tray.

At 11:47, an alarm sounds. They drop everything, don their heavy boots and drive to Our Lady of Fatima Hospital, where someone has unintentionally set off a box alarm.

They return to the station a few minutes after noon and light the gas grill outside the firehouse.

“OK,” says the other cook in the kitchen, firefighter David M. DiChiara. “Try it again.”

The food is almost ready around 12:30 p.m. Grande worries that another alarm will put off lunch for two hours, forcing him to go home on a full stomach, just before his wife puts dinner on the table.

Around 12:40, the firefighters sit down at a long table and chomp on sausage sandwiches.

Grande, one of the last ones to the table, is about half-finished with his sandwich when the alarm sounds again at 12:54. A woman has locked her keys and her baby inside her sedan, which is parked outside Shaw’s Market.

After jimmying their way into the car, the firefighters return a little after 1. It’s almost 1:30 by the time everyone, including members of the rescue squad, have eaten.

PROVIDENCE FIRE DEPARTMENT FOOD POLICY

•Providence Fire Chief George S. Farrell says that firefighters are not allowed to use fire trucks just to go grocery shopping during their work shifts, as is the case in North Providence.

 Until June , on-duty firefighters typically visited markets when they were returning from calls or were on the road for fuel, for truck repairs or for training, according to the firefighters union president, Paul A. Doughty.

 That stopped when Farrell issued a general order that restated regulations that firefighters return directly to their stations from calls and other business, Doughty said. Labor unrest that resurfaced around the time of the U.S. Conference of Mayors meeting in Providence in June helped trigger the order. Since then, Doughty said, firefighters have been coming to work with the food they need.

Farrell acknowledged that certain circumstances, such as when firefighters work longer shifts than normal, can necessitate food shopping while on duty.

 Farrell says firefighters can pickup food as they return to their station after an alarm, but they cannot take a truck out of the firehouse for the specific purpose of acquiring food.

mreynold@projo.com