Public agencies and schools can purchase from the contract without going out for solicitation in most states.
Omnilert's solutions are now available through the popular and widely-accepted U.S. Communities™ Contract. The company’s ENS solutions are listed under “Omnilert” on the GTSI® Corp. (NASDAQ: GTSI) Vendor Partner List. GTSI is a prime contractor of the U.S. Communities Contract for IT Solutions and Services. The City of Charlottesville, Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, and University of Maryland, Baltimore are among the first organizations to purchase Omnilert’s unified emergency notification solutions through GTSI’s U.S. Communities contract vehicle.
“We originally joined U.S. Communities when we were doing some furniture purchasing,” explained Kurt Gabbard, Vice President for Business Affairs at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary. “I got online and started looking at everything available and discovered I could purchase Omnilert here at a discount to the retail price. There is no cost to join U.S. Communities which is advantageous for a small institution like us. Because of our size, we don’t have the volume to justify joining other purchasing consortia that have fees. It’s free and easy to use, so there is no reason not to do it.
“The people at GTSI were very attentive to our needs and followed up very well without being pushy. Besides the phone conversations, they sent a representative to our campus to discuss everything. It was a good experience.
“The cost, the features, and the simplicity of the system made Omnilert a good solution for us. It also came recommended to us by a safety and security director at nearby institution. Omnilert is simple to use, it does what we need it to do, and with minimal amount of administrative time involved. I also like the web-based interface and the mobile phone interface for creating and sending alerts. Omnilert is a good company and they have a reliable system. We have received gratitude from the community that the system is in place.”
The County of Fairfax, VA competitively solicited the I.T. Solutions RFP in 2009 and is available nationwide to state and local government entities that are authorized to enter into cooperative purchasing agreements. The contract offers best value pricing for a wide-range of technology products, services and solutions and there are not costs to public agencies to participate. The contract award runs to April 30, 2013 with three additional 1-year extensions. The U.S. Communities Government Purchasing Alliance is a nationwide purchasing cooperative designed to be a procurement resource for counties, cities, school districts (K-12), higher education, nonprofits, and publicly funded healthcare organizations.
Ara Bagdasarian, President of Omnilert, LLC said, “The U.S. Communities contract is pre-competed, so public agencies and institutions can shorten the procurement process by foregoing the traditional RFP requirement. Among other advantages, this will help you meet implementation timeframes associated with stimulus funding.”
About GTSI
GTSI Corp. provides a Technology Lifecycle Management (TLM) approach to IT infrastructure solutions delivered through industry-leading professional and financial services. GTSI employs a proactive, strategic methodology that streamlines technology lifecycle management, from initial assessment to acquisition, implementation, refresh, and disposal. TLM allows customers to implement solutions quickly and cost-effectively. GTSI’s certified engineers and project managers leverage strategic partnerships with technology innovators. These experts use proven, repeatable processes to design, deploy, manage, and support simple to complex solutions, to meet client’s current and future requirements and business objectives. GTSI is headquartered in Northern Virginia, outside of Washington, D.C. and was named as one of “Best Places to Work” in 2009. Further information about the company is available at www.GTSI.com.
About U.S. Communities™ Government Purchasing Alliance
U.S. Communities is the leading national government purchasing cooperative that assists local and state government agencies, school districts (K-12), higher education, and nonprofits in reducing the cost of purchased goods through pooling the purchasing power of public agencies nationwide. This is accomplished through competitively solicited contracts for quality products, services and solutions through lead public agencies. Contracts result in the annual procurement of more than $1.4 billion in products and services. Each month more than 400 new public agencies register to participate. This continuing rapid growth of public agency participation is fueled by the program’s proven track record of providing public agencies unparalleled value and the best government pricing available. The contract is available to over 90,000 public agencies within state and local government nationwide to procure products and services annually. To learn more, visit: http://www.uscommunities.org.
