I thought we had a bad system in Indiana, but this discussion is making me realize yours is much worse. Coaches have a lot of say in which crews work the tournament, but it's much more indirect. With as many crews as you have, there have to be at least 10 crews qualified to work a state final each year. No crew should work more than one.
Our system has each crew getting a score based on several criteria. Half of the score is based on several factors the crew has some control over: meeting attendance, years of experience, tournament experience, test score, games worked. The other half is based on a coach vote (the indirect part). The coaches in a particular game have no say over the crew they get, but their collective vote is a major criteria where crews are ranked. Every school can vote for every crew so there are situations where one crew will get 80-100 votes while most crews get 20-35 votes. The extra votes are generally positive so they have a huge impact. The ranking then helps the commissioner at the IHSAA assign crews to games. It is a one-man selection committee.
We do have an observer program that started about 5 years ago, but there is still some uncertainty to their role in the process. They get the equivalent to 1 coach vote and their feedback may play a role when the commissioner is trying to decide between two closely ranked crews.
The other part that I think may be good for you to consider. The tournament is 6 rounds and the last 4 rounds must have at least half the crews being "new" crews. New is defined as a crew that hasn't worked a state final. That is based on the referee. If there are 3-4 guys who have worked a state final, but the referee wasn't the white hat on the crew at the time, they are considered a "new" crew. This does help to prevent all state final crews from being repeats. A crew can't work a round until they have worked the previous round in a previous year. For example, even if a crew gets a very high ranking, they may not work a semi-final or final if they have never worked past the 3rd round any previous season.
Once a crew works a state final, they can't work further than a 3rd round game the following season. They could one further round each year returning to the final no earlier than 4 years later.
Other than the importance of the coach vote in the ranking, the logistics of the system do help get some new blood each year in the finals. For the most part the crews working the finals are decent crews. They aren't necessarily better than crews getting only 1 or 2 rounds, but they have the right mix of factors to advance.
Your system of having chapters identify top crews (# should be based on size of chapter) and those chapters assigning the early rounds makes sense. But don't let the coaches have a say in the specific crews. Then for the final rounds (semi-final/final), submit them to the state and let them assign again with no approval from the coaches. Then put criteria in place that crews can't return to the semi-finals/finals any earlier than 3-5 years since their last appearance.
Ultimately no system is perfect. I have friends in the NFL who complain about their system. Whatever your system is you know what it is going in. Control the things you can control and let everything fall where they may. If you don't enjoy working the games you get then maybe you don't enjoy this as much as you think.
