To this point, (at least on this thread) there hasn't been any data shared that merits a serious justification for classing the sport. One argument was asking "how many programs do we have to lose," but then we've had little fluctuation in program count for the past ~15 years.
The data regarding number of forfeits (which I agree appear to be up) would be more compelling. Even if that data screams that there is a participation problem, that's still simply a correlation without any measure of causal effect. Sure participation is lower but maybe class wrestling would help, maybe it wouldn't. Is there data from other states who have made the switch and seen their numbers rise?
Even if the total number of wrestlers is down, seems to me that there would need to be larger analysis to include other sports. Perhaps participation is down in all sports. Is there a strong deviation in wrestling where numbers are down more than other sports? Maybe, maybe not.
Now, leaving objectivity aside, I went to a 1A high school. I was a good wrestling at my high school but average when compared to the broader state perspective. Sure it would have been great to have made a deeper run in a classed tournament. I watched kids who made it to state in Ohio who I knew weren't as good. I got over it. Understood the dynamics and moved on.
I like the charm of our state tournament and having one champ in each weight class. That said, if we would like to consider moving to a classed system in our sport, it's going to take an much more objective approach to quantifying the problem (if there is one) and identifying that class wrestling would, in fact, help solve that problem.