Albany Assemblyman Jack McEneny, fresh from his trip to Ireland and the United Kingdom, toured Albany’s Academy Park this afternoon, where the local Occupy protest has hit Day Five.

McEneny isn’t the first elected pol to check out the seen (U.S. Rep. Paul Tonko’s been there, as have various city officials) but he is the first to check it out following the directive via the Cuomo administration that the city should enforce a curfew at the park. That curfew’s been ignored, so far.

The lawmaker mingled briefly with protesters, some asking about how to secure Porta-Potties.

McEneny gave kudos to the protesters who continue to occupy the city-owned slice of the park (the other half, Lafayette Park, is owned by the state and is bereft of tents).

“I wasn’t here I was out of town, so I don’t have to comment on it,” McEneny said when asked about his reaction to the state’s efforts to expel the protesters. “But just as an observer, from what I’ve seen in the paper, I would think this is the type of thing we should be encouraging, not discouraging. I’ve never seen a better behaved group of citizens for what I think our the right causes.”

Cuomo’s top aide, Larry Schwartz, had phoned Albany Mayor Jerry Jennings about the curfew Friday evening.

Asked if he thought Gov. Andrew Cuomo went too far, McEneny demurred, sort of.

“I don’t know what the governor did. I only know what I read in the papers,” he said. “I would think it would be out of character from what I would expect, particularly from a Democratic governor, to discourage well-behaved dissent.”

McEneny and Cuomo don’t see eye-to-eye on much these days, especially when it comes to matters like redistricting. Cuomo has made varying degrees of pledges to veto a legislative lines drawn by the lawmaker-driven task force, a panel that McEneny is co-chairman.

Both Cuomo and McEneny have exchanged words through reporters on the issue.

And it should be noted that McEneny is no stranger to sit-ins. Last year he staged a protest inside the governor’s ceremonial office known as the Red Room in opposition to then-Gov. David Paterson’s budget cuts under the guise of a tour. The gubernatorial aide who he dealt with for that protest? One Larry Schwartz.

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