Actually, the audacity of a range to keep you safe, and second, to manage it's liability:
It is generally not a brass grab by the range. It is a safety issue. After numerous incidents of brass retrievers (or golden retrievers as they are known) reaching in to adjacent bays, being flagged by loaded weapons as a result of their actions, and/or literally being at the knees of other shooters with a hot range, ranges have felt in some cases the need to make such policy.
When retrievers are in the act of adjacent bay reaching for stray brass at a range that allows holster drawing, that presents the likelihood that said retriever can be flagged by a loaded weapon going in to or out of a holster.
Hopefully, safety is the policy's only motivation; however, even with mixed motives, the unsafe actions of some 'gatherers' has caused this policy. Gathering should be fine when the range is cold, but some of the big ranges with multiple bays and people queued up to shoot may only go cold for when a safety issue makes it necessary.
If you're the only guy on the line, generally RO's should care less even if you're down on all fours. If ten or twelve of the fourteen bays are full and the range is hot, understandably perhaps, don't be reaching over at another guys ankles whilst he is manipulating and firing his weapon.
Not agreeing or disagreeing, just saying there are cases where the range is acting out of safety and liability risk management.
