The Colorado DOW does not "make" a significant amount of money from applicants that purchase preference points/have no chance of drawing. Most of the application cost is quickly returned. The only "cost" to get a point is the time value of money while you wait for a refund. The draw information is available on the DOW website. Many of the units managed as "trophy" units issue 25 - 35 tags per season.

I imagine every elk hunter has seen images of the "elk" meandering around Estes Park (Rocky Mountain National Park) and envisions a 6x behind every tree. Hence the desire to hunt the 20. For the 1st combined season (2nd rifle) in 2008 the DOW shows 135 (111 resident and 21 non-resident) applications for 25 tags. The draw results were 15 tags allotted to residents, 7 to non-residents and three to landowners. About 8% of resident applicant drew while 33% of non-residents did??? The numbers vary but the ratios remain fairly consistent across the seasons.

Like many have said, if you want to hunt the draw units, it makes sense you should have to "pay to play", but your odds of drawing are still better as a NR than a resident. Colorado has NR allocations for the draw. It seems by eliminating the "pay to play", you would have MANY more NR apps chasing the same number of tags. As a resident, it doesn't bother me, but how is that good for NR applicants?