Thanks for all the great feedback. We do have a vertical bandsaw so the miter saw or horz bandsaw would be mainly for cutting long sticks of aluminum down to size.
If we go the miter route I was considering going to a 10" sliding miter saw like
this. That would let us use less expensive 10" blades (rather than our current 12") and replace them more often. Also, my hope is that since you are cutting backwards, sliding the blade back towards the fence, it would be less likely to thrown the work around. Thoughts?