Gov't Hospital as majority owner of a small 501(c)(3) Org.

[Guest wjr]

I have Governmental Hospital (with 501©(3) status) with about 500 total employees that sponsors a Non-ERISA 403(b) pension plan. They have just formed a joint venture (owning 51%) of another 501©(3) organization with 12 employees.

Since this joint venture has only a small (deminimus) number of employees, can they just include them in their non-ERISA plan or will the venture have to establish their own ERISA plan. By the way, the other 49% is owned by a doctors group and the Board is made up of 4 from the Hospital and 3 from the doctors group,