State Sen. Antoine Thompson, D-Buffalo, holds a leadership title, but most Senate Democrats hold some kind of title.

He is chairman of a committee, but at the pleasure of the Senate president.

When the highest-ranking Democrats assembled Thursday to announce the return of Democratic control, Thompson was not among them.

Still, Thompson called a news conference in Buffalo on Friday to declare the Democrats’ new grip on the Senate good for Western New York

because of the influence he wields — as acting majority whip, chairman of the Environmental Conservation Committee and a member of the Senate Democratic Campaign Committee.

“There are 18 leadership positions in the State Senate majority. There are 18 leadership positions in the Republican minority,” Thompson said.

As for the Democrats: “We have two who are from Western New York, and we are in the top 10. In addition to that, each of us chairs a committee.”

Thompson was referring to himself and Sen. William Stachowski, D-Lake View, chairman of the Committee on Commerce, Economic Development and Small Business. Stachowski also holds the title of “assistant majority leader for house operations.”

“In a leadership meeting of the Senate, we have two of the 18 in the room who are from Western New York,” Thompson said.

Stachowski, too, was absent Thursday when the top Democratic senators announced they had lured the final renegade — Sen.

Pedro Espada of the Bronx — back to the Democratic side, restoring Democratic control of the Senate after a 31-day stalemate.

For decades, the supreme leaders of the Senate and Assembly have parceled out superfluous legislative titles that carried bonus payments, or “lulus,” worth several thousand dollars a year to their members.

Thompson, for example, earns an extra $22,000 as acting majority whip. Stachowski, with his “house operations” title, makes $25,000 atop a legislator’s base of $79,500.

With lulus, the Senate and Assembly rulers have kept their members in line while concentrating power in the hands of a few in their inner circle.

Because most political power resides in the population centers of New York City and its suburbs, today it is the rare upstate legislator who attracts notice in Albany.

At one point during the recent stalemate, Stachowski and Thompson called a news conference to complain about Republican inaction on major bills. Reporters from other parts of the state walked out when realizing that truly influential Senate leaders were not attending.

Further, neither Thompson nor Stachowski was part of the major talks to resolve the coup. Those discussions involved the upper echelon of the Senate Democratic conference, members from Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn and the Bronx.

Late last year, when Senate Democrats prepared to again take control of the Senate after four decades of Republican domination, they had to quell a rebellion by giving away perks to some downstate Democrats threatening to bolt. The leaders gave away the chairmanship of the influential Senate Finance Committee that was to be Stachowski’s.

The State Legislature’s feudal system led the Brennan Center for Justice to brand it as “dysfunctional” in a landmark report and in follow-up reports. But now that any Democratic senator can upend Democratic control by straying, even one of the Brennan Center’s authors wonders if Albany, or at least the Senate, has indeed seen a new day.

“Ordinarily, I would say if you are not in the very upper ranks, then you are not going to have much influence,” said senior counsel Lawrence Norden. “But this may be different under the latest circumstances, with such a narrow margin and things being so fluid.”

“There is potential for any senator who wants to take it to exert more influence,” he added.

At his Friday news conference, Thompson made it clear he’s not the senator who will ever stray to the Republican side. He acknowledged that, like Stachowski, appeals were directed his way to cross over.

He said he never would have taken them. He doesn’t think the Republicans would advance the urban agenda he and the Democratic Party support. He now wants the Democrats to pad their majority with election victories, which he will advance as a member of their campaign committee.

Thompson said he has stood among the Democratic leaders during other public events but did not attend Thursday’s announcement of Espada’s return because he was tired and knew he had a news conference planned Friday back home.

“You had to have people who stuck to their guns and stuck to their morals. And that’s what Sen. Thompson did,” said Masten District Council Member Demone A. Smith, one of the Thompson supporters who created a crowd to welcome him.

Senate Democrats now have a sort of three-headed leadership: Sen. John L. Sampson of Brooklyn is the conference leader; Espada is now the majority leader; Sen. Malcolm A. Smith of Queens is the Senate president. Thompson called him the CEO.

Would Thompson ever buck their wishes on matters he believes in?

“I always do,” he said. “I’m a troublemaker.”

News Albany Bureau Reporter Tom Precious contributed to this report.