Advisory Opinions

Requests for interpretations and other rulings under Title 1 of ERISA are handled by the Office of Regulations and Interpretations under the provisions established by ERISA Procedure 76-1. The office answers inquiries from individuals and organizations in the form of advisory opinions, which apply the law to a specific set of facts, or information letters, which merely call attention to well established principles or interpretations.

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**1989**
AO/ Date/ Reference	Recipient	Description of Request
1989-20A 08/18/1989 3(1)	Mr. Ernest P. Ritchey Vice President Federal Employee Association 1747 Citadel Plaza, #101 San Antonio, TX 78209	Whether the FEA/GEA Dental Health Care Plan is an employee welfare benefit plan within the meaning of section 3(1) of Title I of ERISA.
1989-19A 08/18/1989 3(40)	Mr. Roy M. Larson Tacoma Industrial Trust 808 No. 2nd Tacoma, Washington 98403	Whether the Tacoma Industrial Trust, established to provide life and accident, dental, vision care, drugs, pharmaceutical supplies, health benefits and prepaid legal benefits for employees of participating employers, is an employee welfare benefit plan covered by Title I of ERISA. Whether each employer electing to provide benefits described in section 3(1) through the Trust has established its own separate employee welfare benefit plan subject to Title I of ERISA.
1989-18A 08/18/1989	John M. Vine, Esq. Covington & Burling 1201 Pennsylvania Ave., NW PO Box 7566 Washington, DC 20044	Whether a certain sale of securities from the General Electric Pension Trust to an underwriting syndicate of which Kidder, Peabody & Co. Incorporated was a member was a prohibited transaction within the meaning of section 406 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) and section 4975 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986.
1989-17A 08/07/1989 3(40)	Mr. Homer Elliot Drinker, Biddle & Reath Philadelphia National Bank Building Broad and Chestnut Streets Philadelphia, PA 19107	Whether the WBMA, Inc. Voluntary Employee Benefit Trust is an employee welfare benefit plan within the meaning of section 3(1) of title I of ERISA and whether the Trust is a multiple employer welfare arrangement (MEWA) within the meaning of section 3(40) of title I of ERISA.
1989-16A 08/04/1989 3(32) 4(b)(1)	Ms. Ann Crawford Butler & Binion 1600 First Interstate Bank Plaza 1000 Louisiana Houston, TX 77002-5008	Whether the Police Plan is a governmental plan within the meaning of section 3(32) of Title I of ERISA and, thus, is excluded from the requirements of title I of ERISA; as well as the applicable requirements of section 414(d) of the Internal Revenue.
1989-15A 08/03/1989	Mr. Erwin Millimet Stroock & Stroock & Lavan 7 Hanover Square New York, NY 10004-2594	Whether, upon formation of a partnership that intends to comply with the venture capital operating company exception contained in section 29 CFR 2510.3-101, the funds received as initial capital contributions from employee benefit plans will constitute plan assets prior to the partnership's first "venture capital investment".
1989-14A 08/02/1989	Donald J. Myers, Esq. Reed, Smith, Shaw & McClay 1200 18th Street, NW Washington, DC 20036	Whether the investment in publicly offered limited partnerships; would satisfy the "freely transferable" requirement of the "publicly-offered" exception contained in the plan asset regulation section 29 CFR 2510.3-101(b)(2).
1989-13A 07/20/1989 3(40) 3(5)	Mr. John N. Erlenborn Seyfarth, Shaw, Fairweather & Geraldson 815 Connecticut Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20006-4004	Whether either the Better Business Bureau Insurance Trust or the utilization of the Trust (the Trust) to provide health care and other benefits to the employees of Griffith's Five Day Tire Store constitutes a MEWA within the meaning of 3(40) and an employee welfare benefit plan within the meaning of section 3(1) of Title I of ERISA. Whether section 514(a) of title I of ERISA would preempt any state law from regulating the Trust.
1989-12A 07/14/1989 4975( c)(1)(F)	Mr. David M. Rosenberger Dykema Gosset Suite 3000 505 North Woodward Avenue Bloomfield Hills, Michigan 48013	Whether the receipt of "free checking" account services by a customer who directs his IRA to invest $2000 in a Bank financial products would be a prohibited transaction within the meaning of section 4975(c)(1) of the Code.
1989-11A 07/13/1989 407	Mr. Leon E. Irish, Esq. Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue 1450 G Street, NW Washington, DC 20005-2008	Whether (1) the amendment and merger of the six Defined Benefit (DB) plans into one DB plan, and (2) the amendment of the stock bonus plan, under the circumstances described therein, would not render the grandfather provision of section 9345(a)(3) of OBRA 87, inapplicable to the Arrangement.