A lawyer and Queens political operative with ties to Rep. Gregory Meeks, Senate President Malcolm Smith and Gov. Paterson has been quietly moved off the Senate Democrats’ payroll.

Joan Flowers helped set up the controversial New Direction Local Development Corp., whose Hurricane Katrina fund-raising arm has been exposed in a series of Post articles for its unaccounted hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations.

Flowers’ last day with Senate Dems was yesterday, spokesman Austin Shafran said. He insisted she “left under her own volition.”