Your team has done a great job of overcoming adversity the past couple of years, and has represented itself very well at the competitions. It would be a shame to see that momentum end, especially with a Regional now in Sacramento. The suggestions and comments in the replies to your request have all been good.
In case the information has not been passed on to you, a good resource for Northern California teams is the WRRF (Western Region Robotics Forum). This group of teams meets monthly at San Jose State University (which I know is a bit of a drive from Sac), but they also put on some really helpful workshops in Oct, Nov, and Dec. In fact, they are having a rookie/newer team forum and information meeting this Saturday, Oct 5th from 12-3 at San Jose State. The focus of the meeting this Saturday is for teams with exactly the questions and issues you expressed. If you or other team members are able to attend, want more info about the workshops, or want to get on the WRRF e-mail list - just send a request to them at:
wrrf2002@wrrf.org
Hope that helps. Hopefully having a new Regional in Sacramento should make it a lot easier to get school and community people out to see your team and a competition this year - which makes getting support and sponsors much easier.