Thanks again, John,

very helpful stuff. I'm sure I'll be back with more detailed questions at some point in time.

>>>Some basic questions need to be answered. What is the budget?
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>>Right now, the NGO is trying to find out what the cost will be like. Then we will be looking for grants/assistance from the private sector here. Depending on the expense, I guess international grants will need to be investigated.
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>>>Are you planning on writing the software or having someone write custom software?
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>>I'm looking for something off the shelf that can be implemented quickly and works well, with a proven history.
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>>>And the list of questions goes on and on. I would think someone over there could show you some of their software.
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>>Yes, I am trying to meet with the IT department, but didn't want to go in unprepared. I've seen the system they use for tracking accidents/incidents, it looks like it is running on a VAX, and they use KEATerm to access it to do the data entry from some big yellow forms that get sent in to the head office from around the country. Needless to say they are months behind.
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>>>Most of the stuff I've seen is pretty expensive, with high annual maintenance fees. Many police and sheriff's departments in the US go for grant money to facilitate this. I don't know how your financial situation looks, so that is hard to discuss. I think you might save them some headaches if you hired someone with experience in law enforcement to help you put an RFP together. Then you can also get them to review the proposals when they come in. You MUST, or someone MUST make site visits where the vendors software is running. You MUST talk to the users and the administrators of those departments about the software and the support they receive.
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>>Can you point me to a list of some of the software and vendors that have good reputations and software?
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>>Thanks for all the great advice and help!
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>The Memphis Police Dept and the Sheriff's Office both use a system from a vendor called Visionaire. It houses the data in MS SQL Server, so it was fine for me. I'm not sure what the front end is done in, maybe Powerbuilder or Delphi. I don't think you will find anything "off the shelf" because every dept wants to do it "their way." I have downloaded one of the apps from Crimestar, but haven't had a chance to look at it. I'd recommend getting someone who is police savvy, that has worked with software and vendors, and understands the issues of installation, support, upgrades, customization costs, etc. If you aren't careful, you can wind up with a bad product, that costs a lot of money, doesn't do what needs to be done, and is very expensive to customize. You will need to know what the cost of customization is before signing off. You also should request a performance bond on the software, in case the company doesn't deliver, you can throw them out and keep the money spent.
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>I would also demand that you are allowed to report off their data from any other application. I doubt they will allow you to stuff data in, without paying them to do it, but I want it in writing that you are free to pull any data you want, w/o having to pay additional fees.