There has to be something else motivating this move. The lines for wristbands are manned by CMs already onstage so there aren't extra CM hours involved - they are just redeployed. The wristbands are produced in house at very high volumes so that isn't much of a savings. My guess would be that Guests have whined to CMs while standing in line...that got info got passed along...and, viola. Problem is that those are the Guests that whine about everything - you just can't make some people happy.
According to my CM friend, this is just being tested over the next couple of weeks. How about having Bawb stop in at City Hall and grill the CMs there about the reason for the change? Then he could do it as his rapid fire on an upcoming podcast.