[Discuss] Building a non-profit membership list?

[richb at pioneer.ci.net (Rich Braun)]

I volunteered to be webmaster for a smallish non-profit (list size = 4000) and
alas what they need isn't what I'm particularly well-versed in recently.  Long
ago I did a list-management project, size=20,000, but that was with custom
software long before modern CRM evolved.

Digging in a little, what this non-profit has trouble with is member
communications.  They use a crappy email relay that's listed on at least one
of the RBL services, and they have to periodically import/export member info
from some offline database into their email-sending service.

I have no earthly idea what the best solutions are for this; EventBrite,
SalesForce, ConstantContact are probably way out of the price-league of a
non-profit.  So -- just wanted some advice on solving this for completely
non-technical people who want a piece of tech to solve this issue.

As I see it, I need something that maintains a complete list of details for
each person, and event registration with payment processing capability for
memberships and event-signups but in a properly-secured way.  WordPress has
two completely separate plugins (WP-CRM and Events Manager) that don't seem to
solve my problem in a way that non-tech people can grasp.

-rich