They should have never went to the lottery system.
In the mid-to late 80's more and more over the counter licenses were being sold....also success numbers were going down....plan and simple bear hunting was becoming more popular.....
But the major reason anti-hunters were working to stop bear hunting first with dogs then go after all bear hunting....
With area quotas and hunter quotas it would be easer to prove the numbers of bears and a harvestable numbers are available....
LP in the early 70's you could buy over the counter tags but also needed to apply to hunt and limited permits were issued....
What kind of quality hunt would there be if 35'000 + over the counter tags were sold....sure wouldn't be fun and success rates would be less than 1%....bear number would drop fast....
Not like a deer where a doe will have 1-2 sometimes 3 fawns a year ...some sows don't breed until the 3-4 years old and then may have twins its very rare more....if they don't have a good fat supply for winter they will abort the fetus to save them selves....on the average a sow needs to weight 160 lbs going into hibernation.....