GULF SHORES, Ala. — Workers were all over the parking lot at Gulf State Park’s beach Saturday morning sporting bright green, orange and white T-shirts emblazoned with “Qualified Community Responder.”

They were given boots, rakes, shovels, coolers of waters and tents for shade. All bought locally if possible.

“We are using all local vendors to buy equipment,” said Scott Lee of Plant Performance Services, also known as P2S. “We’re trying to make sure all the money spent is spent locally, as directed by the governor’s office and BP. We use local restaurants to buy lunches and rotate between them each day.”

After two weeks of training, the crews were finally called to hit the beach at Gulf State Park.

“We are out to clean up the tar balls,” Lee said. “We have been assigned to hire local unemployed workers. We have 500 people in Baldwin County and 500 in Mobile County. The governor’s office has asked us to hire Baldwin County people to work in Baldwin County and Mobile County workers to work in Mobile County.

“Everybody has been through extensive background checks and extensive training for the last two weeks. The state helped organize everything, but we are paid by BP.”

The company also has 200 workers in each county in Florida for oil cleanup.

On Sunday, Katie Bass of New Mexico was enjoying a day at the beach with her grandkids at Cotton Bayou. She was visiting family in the area and didn’t want to pass up a chance to go to the beach.

“We were going to go to Gulf Shores, but before we got out of the car a woman told us there was lots of oil there,” Bass said. “She told us to come here.

“There is some oil here and you can see it staining the white bathing suits, but it’s worth it to get in the ocean. All the way from New Mexico to play in the oil.”

Over in Gulf Shores at the public beach, a lifeguard who declined to be identified said the oil hadn’t hurt crowds.

“It’s about a normal crowd for a Saturday,” he said. “But people are mad. They want it cleaned up.”

Bags of gathered up oil lined the beaches, but plenty was still evident in mats of seaweed all long the Gulf Shores beach.

“They’re trying to get the rake on one of the tractors and rake it through,” the lifeguard said. “I got some on my foot earlier and I just scrubbed it with Dawn soap and it came right off. Some people are using baby oil.”