Brettski, as far as regulations are concerned, take the word of your local officials. They're the ones that will enforce the regulations and you want to work with them, not against them.
NEDOC, many of the changes in the various CRP programs have come from research done by NE GFP, especially at the Norfork office. For upland game birds, they found that very heavy disking was the most cost effective management tool by far.
I'm impatient, so here's what I would do. I would burn the brome off in early winter or very first thing in the spring to get rid of the thatch. Then, just as soon as the cool season grass started growing again, I would hit it hard with Round-Up. This would really set the brome back but you will still have lots of seed left in the ground. If you have any warm season grasses or seed left, you will see it that fall.
More than grasses, it's the forbs that are important to raise young chicks. Illinois bundleflower is so good that there really isn't a close second. Second tier forbs are annual sunflowers, showy partridge pea, Maximillian sunflowers and false sunflowers. Then comes a whole host of wildflowers that are pretty and attract insects for the chicks to eat.
Bill Whitney (with others) wrote a book about restoring native prairie that I think you would love.
