A couple of issues:
1. While it'd be highly desirable to have a translation that can be freely used and reprinted without royalty issues, there's still a need for copyright protection. Not to protect the right to profit. But to protect the translation from being co-opted by heretics. Having put that much work into it, you want to make sure others don't come along and make changes to your text which they then pass off as being your work. And copyright protection is meaningless without a legal team to enforce it. That's one reason why the publishing houses, rahter than churches, are now in the translation business. They have the means and experience to protect a translation from being messed with.
2. The other thing the publishing houses have is marketing expertise. The fact is, there are many small-time Bible translations that began with noble purposes but have never caught on. So whatever effort you come up with would have to have some noteriety backing it up. If not a publishing house, then a large coalition of churches or influential Christian leaders who will endorse the finished product. One problem is: can you get such leaders/churches to agree on how to go about the project and to endorse it once it's done even though they don't know yet how it'll turn out?
These are some reasons the publishing houses control the translation game right now. And despite the problems with that, there are also difficulties with other methods.
