NIAGARA FALLS — The run up to Memorial Day 2010 was marred by a lot of blustering over closing state parks to fill New York’s budget hole. 

On Friday, state lawmakers came to an agreement to keep the parks open.

They did it by increasing taxes and fees applied to businesses statewide.

I don’t have proof or anything, but I find it hard to believe any of this was truly necessary.

Keeping the lawn mowed at state parks is our top budget-cutting priority?

At times like these, I can’t help but think about neighborhood legislative offices.

A few months back I wrote a story about the big dollars being spent on district headquarters and Albany branches and staffers and aides and consultants and managers to fill them. Not to mention the salaries and benefits for the state senators and assembly members themselves.

The fine folks at the Empire Center research group put together an overview of office-related spending in the state Legislature for the six-month period ending Sept. 30, 2009.

The names should be familiar to you.

Assemblyman Robin Schimminger, D-North Tonawanda, ranked fifth in Assembly spending at $332,115. He outspent Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, D-Manhatten, whose six-month office budget came in at $311,971. Assemblywoman Francine DelMonte, D-Niagara Falls, ranked 99th in the Assembly, with expenses totaling $146,366. State Sen. Antoine Thompson, D-Niagara Falls and Buffalo, ranked 12th in the Senate with expenditures totaling $422,650. State Sen. George Maziarz finished 39th, with an office budget for the six-month period of $325,111.

In six months, four state lawmakers representing parts of Niagara County spent more than $1.2 million on their offices and staff. Toss in Silver’s expenses and you’re in the $1.5 million neighborhood. Both legislative houses combined spent nearly $30 million on places to hang their coats and people to answer constituent telephone calls.

For all the personnel expenses tied to members of the Legislature, what benefits are being provided to the taxpayers picking up the tab?

Go ahead, ask yourself, how often has a state Senate staffer or Assembly aide bettered your existence? 

Do you interact with them more than, say, you might visit an area state park in a given week or month?

I work with some of these state office people. I’m sure many of them work hard and some of them are very nice people.

I like a lot of people working in the private sector too and, in reality, many of them are losing hours, being forced into unpaid time off or scrambling to find new jobs altogether because their companies downsized or folded.

This is today’s reality.

Internal evaluations are taking place in offices across America.

Why shouldn’t the same thing be happening in legislative offices across New York?

I really think there ought to be a rule barring any state lawmaker from complaining about lack of funds prompting reductions in services until they themselves are prepared to make sacrifices of their own.

As teachers and parks workers and others are being shown the door in hopes of filling New York’s enormous budget hole, the senators and assembly people remain oddly silent about when it will be their turns exactly.

Instead, we get threats about closing state parks on Memorial Day weekend and press releases blaming the other guys for failing to make the hard decisions and continuing to add to the burden placed on businesses.

Here’s some advice on what to do instead:

Go into your office, close the door and have a talk with your people.

Tell them you're going to take a voluntary cut in pay until things improve.

Ask them to do the same.

If they refuse, thank them for their service and show them the door.

Take the money saved and give it to the people who push the lawnmowers at state parks.

At least we all know what we’re getting from them.

When it comes to state lawmakers and their aides and their office managers and their consultants, very often, we’re not quite as sure.