Shared Contacts in Outlook 2007/Exchange 2007

Previously, we had Exch 2003/Outlook 2003. We had a public folder set up for
shared contacts, and every user had ticked the "Show as an Outlook Address
Book".

Since our move to Exch2007, our administrator refuses to enable Public
Folders, because he says it is not supported anymore (it is until 2016,
according to MS). Nonetheless, we want our Shared Contacts back (as an
Outlook Address Book).

When reading the documentation I have on Windows Sharepoint Services 3.0, I
believe it is possible to make a shared contact list and adding that to
Outlook 2007 as an Address Book. I tried it with Portal Server 2003, and I
can indeed do this. However, I'm missing some very important features for us
like editing directly from Outlook and creating and editing distribution
lists . This seems to be possible in WSS 3.0/Portal Server 2007.

Can you confirm that this is indeed possible in WSS 3.0 and/or Portal Server
2007?

Or is there any other way to have a shared contact list in Outlook 2007
without resorting back to enabling Public Folders? Sharing an individuals
Contact list as described in a few postings is not an option.