Point #2 - list of new teams in the area can easily be asked for from the local Regional Director or Senior Mentor in the area
List of Senior Mentors:
http://www.usfirst.org/community/vol...mentor-program
Regional directors list here:
http://www.usfirst.org/regional-contacts
If nothing else, the RD/FSM can send your contact info to the new teams.
Teams should be helping other lower resource teams in their area regardless of whether FIRST provides an incentive. If they aren't, they are missing one I consider a fundamental feature of FIRST that differentiates it from other robotic programs.
I don't know of any special push for teams in CA this year (MI is a different case this last year). We had about the same amount of growth we normally do, I think our attrition was lower than usual this year. So there must be a different explanation for the lower OPR in CA.
I think the Ri3D stuff that came out in the last couple years has done more to help the level of competition than any other efforts in the recent past. Promoting these effort will go along way to helping the quality of play