I warned ’em but to no avail. Yesterday, the MTA board members — or at least those who decided to show up — had to face a room full of pissed off Staten Islanders, and based on reports in the Staten Island Advance and on NY1, it was not a pretty scene.

At the last of the fare hike hearings before this weekend’s big Public Engagement Workshop, the touring fare hike circus journeyed to that hard-to-reach Staten Island to discuss transit options with a bunch of disgruntled Staten Island residents. As NY1’s Amanda Farinacci relates, things started out bad and only got worse.

To highlight the transit problems facing Staten Island, State Senator Diane Savino leveled an indictment of the MTA’s designated start time for the hearing. “There is a hearing held here at 6 p.m., and if they lived in any other borough, the vast majority of people would be able to get here,” she said. “But most Staten Islanders are still on their way home.”

Maura Yates, of Staten Island’s hometown newspaper, had more of the gruesome details:

The officials about to vote on a proposed fare and toll hike probably haven’t experienced the hell of standing up for hours on a stifling express bus with no bathroom, day in and day out. So several furious Staten Islanders who took the microphone during the public hearing that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority conducted last night at the Petrides Educational Complex in Sunnyside challenged them to do just that.

And at least two MTA officials said they’d be willing to make the trip. “I know the pain, I feel it,” said Todt Hill resident Frank Powers, who is Staten Island’s representative on the board. He said he experiences the traffic firsthand driving home from MTA headquarters in Midtown. “It’s not a question that none of us know it,” he said. “We do know it.”

He said, he’d be willing to board an express bus “at 57th Street at 5 o’clock, if that’s what it takes.” Hilary Ring, the MTA’s director of government affairs, said he would come, too.

I’m not sure that’s what it takes, Frank. For one day, you, one of three privileged MTA board members who openly admitted to shunning public transit during rush hour commuets, will experience the joys of a two-hour bus ride from home to work. And then you’ll go back to your car. I’m sure that’ll convince Powers to vote against the fare hike.

Meanwhile, Staten Islanders annoyed at constant Verrazano Bridge construction and few other transit options for escaping the Island even challenged the MTA on their bathroom breaks. Yates relates the tale of one Joseph Mizrahi who noted that one of the board members had left for a bathroom break one hour into the hearing. “Think of the people who don’t have that luxury” while trapped on buses for two hours or more each afternoon, he said. “Who are you to judge fare increases on something you can’t even relate to?”

With the end of this bitter hearing, the only public forum standing between the MTA board and the fare hike vote is Saturday’s workshop. This is it, folks. If we want to further drive home the point that no one wants the fare hike, show up to this hearing. But be prepared to present alternatives. How can the MTA fund its debt service and expansion plans without a fare hike? If we can’t answer these questions, we’ll have to face the reality of a fare hike, and the MTA will have to face a very bitter ridership.

Ask any Staten Islander how the rest of New York City views the oft-forgotten borough, and more often than not, the answer is last and least. The MTA, according to residents of the Island, is no exception.

One week after the traveling fare hike hearing circus hit the road and made its way through the City’s four other boroughs, Staten Island is getting its day in the sun on Tuesday. And despite recent announcements of expanded service along the Staten Island Railroad, the Island’s residents are not happy, to say the least.

Over the weekend, The Daily News noted that Staten Island residents are more than annoyed with the MTA. Because of ongoing construction on the Verrazano Bridge, residents are dealing with constant traffic and extra-long commutes. As it is, Staten Island has no underground connection to the rest of New York City, and residents are feeling more neglected than usual. People who live in New Jersey and Long Island get home sooner is a popular and not inaccurate refrain among Staten Islanders.

While Pete Donohue’s piece in The News scratched the surface of the Staten Island problem, two recent editorials in the Staten Island Advance show the underlying animosity between Staten Island residents and the MTA. The first dealt with the expanded SIR service. In it, the Advance notes that MTA CEO and Executive Director Elliot Sander is the first MTA head to show any interest in Staten Island in a long time. The second is more critical:

Maybe it’s just coincidence that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority scheduled Staten Island last in its series of required public hearings on the proposed fare and toll increases. You probably won’t persuade many Staten Island commuters of that, however. They’re used to this borough’s transportation needs being at the bottom of the MTA’s list of priorities.

The first five hearings took place last week around the city and the region. The hearing here will take place Tuesday evening at 6 p.m. at the Michael J. Petrides Educational Complex, Building C. Maybe it’s a coincidence, too, that the hearing is scheduled to start at 6 p.m. on Tuesday. That’s a time of the evening when home is still an hour or more away for many commuters who live here.

The early start time leads to the suspicion that the MTA really doesn’t want to hear what Staten Islanders think about the fare and toll hikes. As a matter of fact, if the past is any indication, a handful of second-tier MTA officials will show up at the hearing, listen with barely concealed boredom to riders’ complaints about fares and service, then leave promptly at a pre-designated time before everyone’s had a chance to be heard.

Yikes. Talk about a vendetta.

For Staten Islanders, though, this is a legitimate problem. The only road connecting their island to the rest of the city is a bridge to Bay Ridge. Otherwise, a railway and ferry provide access to Manhattan, but commute times can be painfully long.

Over on Subchat, a few good contributors are engaged in a long dialogue concerning the subway and Staten Island. One contributor suggested looking into extending the 1 train or the Second Ave. Subway to Staten Island, but that’s a multi-billion-dollar project that wouldn’t see the light of day for decades. In the meantime, express bus service may be the Island’s last good hope.

No matter the solution, when the fare hike hearing arrives on Tuesday, the MTA will face some bitter Staten Island residents. Bitter over the fare hike, bitter over the poor transportation options, bitter over ongoing bridge construction, these New Yorkers may just put up the strongest fight yet against the MTA’s fare hike proposal. That is, if the transit officials don’t talk everyone to sleep in the first 45 minutes of the meeting.