Lance LeFleur’s first day as head of Alabama’s environmental protection agency 15 years ago couldn’t have been more harrowing than facing a sweltering room filled with angry shrimpers.

They gathered in Bayou La Batre seeking information and guidance moments after the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 people and sending 134 million gallons of oil gushing into the Gulf.

“It was 95 degrees outside, and the A/C in this room was broke,” recalled Chris Blankenship, the commissioner of the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources who was with LeFleur at the time. “It was packed, wall-to-wall. They weren’t happy. There was almost a riot there. I told Lance, ‘This is the worst first day of your career and it can only go up from there.’”

LeFleur called it a “daunting time” to start the job as ADEM director, during a dedication ceremony Wednesday in Mobile for a building that bears his name and one that is paid for mostly with funds stemming from the nation’s worst-ever environmental disaster.

Come May 1, LeFleur will retire as the longest serving ADEM director ever in Alabama.

“I’m confident that this building will be a lasting legacy for the efforts of so many people who helped the state recover from the negative consequences of the oil spill and which has made us a better place to live,” LeFleur said.

Ahead of his retirement, LeFleur was honored with the dedication of the Lance R. LeFleur Coastal Alabama Field Office. The $13 million field office, which opened in March, is a 15,000-square-foot building that centralizes ADEM’s Mobile workforce under one roof. It will also provide resources to federal agencies during future emergencies.

The project was paid for with $7.9 million from the Alabama Gulf Coast Recovery Council (AGCRC), the 10-member group that provides funding to the Gulf region from settlement funds stemming from the oil spill.

The Alabama Legislature allocated $3 million and ADEM covered the remaining costs.

“We are honoring the person most responsible for getting this project built and for keeping Alabama’s environment safe for us and future generations,” Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey said.

Blankenship said the lessons learned during the onset of the oil spill led to the focus of developing a new ADEM office in Mobile.

The office is close to the area headquarters for both the U.S. Coast Guard and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. It’s located along Broad Street, and a short distance to the future Brookley by the Bay, the future 98-acre waterfront park that will someday feature beaches, an amphitheater and other amenities along the western shore of Mobile Bay.

Scott Hughes, ADEM’s field operations division head, said the building’s location offers a “tremendous opportunity” along Broad Street near Interstate 10 and at the entrance to the Mobile Aeroplex at Brookley. He said the location was part of a vision LeFleur had for the building.

“I don’t think anyone can envision in the next five years the amount of pedestrian, foot and bike traffic through here,” Hughes said, crediting the potential increase in recreational opportunities to the development of the Brookley by the Bay.

Mobile Mayor Sandy Stimpson also reflected on the developing relationship between ADEM and the city during his initial tenure as mayor in 2013 and 2014. At the time, the city had been facing mounting fines from ADEM over polluted waterways.

Since then, the city has made investments in litter traps and through other efforts to control some of the problems.

“When people trust each other, you can make things happen on a timely basis,” Stimpson said. “That’s the way I look at my friendship with Lance.”

But the BP disaster, recognized on its 15th anniversary nationally on Sunday, continued to loom over the building dedication and LeFleur’s historic run as the head of ADEM.

He credited his staff for putting in what he said was the equivalent of 30 work years, and over 60,000 hours, on the Alabama Gulf Coast following the Deepwater Horizon explosion.

“The building is truly a testament to a lot of work by a lot of people,” he said.