New York

If these were rolled in with the other elections, it would save a ton of $$

According to our elections office, the reason we do it this way has to do with who is funding the election:
City local options are partially funded by the the city
other elections are funded by the state

In fact, election workers are not paid the same amount in every election. We have a variety of oddball elections which do not have much in the way of turn out