Democratic and Republican lawmakers said that progress was made in a closed-door meeting with Governor David Paterson today, as they tried to settle the State Senate’s nearly month-long power struggle that has frozen the legislators’ agendas and salaries.

Paterson, acting as a mediator, changed the times for the weekend’s special sessions to reportedly allow senators the chance to return home for part of the holiday weekend.

Instead of 3 p.m. sessions, the 62 senators met at 11 a.m. today and will meet again at 6 p.m. Sunday.

During today’s seven-minute session, the senators paid brief tribute to veterans.

“I think emotions were obviously heightened for the last several weeks and now we’ve come to his office and we’ve said, ‘We want to resolve this,'” said Democratic Bronx Senator Pedro Espada Jr. after meeting with the governor. “We need [Paterson’s] leadership, not in terms of bashing the legislature but in terms of working as a leader to resolve this impasse. He’s accepted that challenge and I think we’ve made great progress.”

The Senate stalemate dates from June 8, when Espada and Democratic Queens Senator Hiram Monserrate sided with Republicans to vote to oust Democratic Queens Senator Malcolm Smith as senate majority leader.

Monserrate has since rejoined the Democratic conference, leaving no clear majority in the Senate.

Since June 23, the Senate has been gaveling in and out of brief special sessions ordered by the governor, and missed major legislative deadlines on June 30.

In return, Paterson asked State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli on Thursday to withhold the senators’ salaries.

“It’s time for the Senate to get back to business,” said DiNapoli. “They need to do the people’s business and I’m hoping that this action, will help encourage them to do that.”

Yet some senators say the governor’s moves in the last week were distractions from real problem solving.

“We are trying to move the agenda. We think that we will put our staffs together with some other members, and allow them to get together and begin to try to put some kind of framework around both a long-term and a short-term agreement,” said Smith on Friday.

Meanwhile, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the Senate’s failure to vote on a half-percent tax increase before June 30 has cost the city as much as $60 million in revenue, which could have been used to pay for essential services.

(Source: NY1)