A Mississauga-based real estate developer has made the largest corporate donation to a Canadian hospital in history.
Orlando Corporation will bestow a $75M gift to Trillium Health Partners (THP) to help build the largest hospital in the country.
From that donation, $50M has been earmarked to assist with the construction of The Peter Gilgan Mississauga Hospital, which is slated to start in 2025. Upon completion, the 24-storey facility will have over 950 beds and 23 operating rooms, serving more patients than any other hospital in Canada.
A further $10M will go towards the construction of a two-floor mental health inpatient unit within the new hospital. The remaining $15M of Orlando Corporation's donation will support the Institute for Better Health, THP's research and innovation arm.
"This means so much to Trillium Health Partners because, of all of the hospitals in Ontario, we will face the most demand for our services over the next 20 years," Caroline Riseboro, President and CEO of Trillium Health Partners Foundation, told STOREYS.
"This donation will allow us to build new space and to provide critical care for our community. It will have so much of an impact. We’re thrilled for what this means in terms of the health of so many people."
Blair Wolk, President of Orlando Corporation, said the developer was "delighted" to support the hospital's growth and to be investing in research that would lead to a more "efficient and accessible" healthcare system.
The developer is also motivating the hospital network to raise an additional $75M, bringing the total contribution to $150M.
Approved by the provincial government in 2021, the Peter Gilgan Mississauga Hospital is now in the advanced planning stages, with early development, including parkade construction, underway. At 2.8M sq. ft., the new facility will be nearly triple the size of THP Mississauga Hospital, which it is replacing.
In addition to the outgoing Mississauga facility, THP also operates Credit Valley Hospital and the Queensway Health Centre in Toronto.
Just over a year ago, the Peter Gilgan Foundation made a $105M donation to THP, a portion of which will go towards the construction of its namesake hospital. The donation is the largest made to a hospital by an individual in Canadian history.
"We've always seen philanthropy go to a lot of the downtown hospitals, and oftentimes community hospitals are thought of as a sort of a second cousin. But COVID really shone a light on the significant pressure that community hospitals are facing," Riseboro said.
"Now, donors are interested in supporting community hospitals because they realize it's the community hospitals that are most on the front lines of leading edge care. For our hospital, which is the largest in Canada, to receive this kind of philanthropy -- the single largest corporate donation and the single largest donation from an individual -- I think just shines such a spotlight on the role that community hospitals play in delivering health care to so many citizens in our province."
