$10 million donation from Rayla and George Myhal doubles every gift to new hospitals
Rayla Myhal has a phrase from her father that she keeps close: give with an open heart. Mehraj Din was a respected figure in his Mississauga community who believed in philanthropy.
He said those words often.
Now, through a $10 million commitment from the Myhal Family Foundation, his daughter and her husband, George Myhal, are making sure many more people hear them.
The gift to Trillium Health Partners Foundation supports Built for Us, the foundation’s historic $1 billion campaign.
It is an invitation, not a single gift.
The Myhals will match community donations dollar for dollar over the coming months.
Every contribution, from a child’s handful of coins to a major family gift, will count twice.
The family announced the gift recently in the atrium of Credit Valley Hospital, before more than 75 hospital and foundation staff, board members, leaders, and media.
It is the hospital where Rayla’s father received his care.
The physician and nurse who looked after him were in the room.
“This hospital is more than bricks and mortar.” Rayla Myhal told the audience.
“It’s a beacon of our community. It’s a place where people of all backgrounds, cultures, and faiths are embraced with the same warmth and deep human respect when families need it the most.”
She spoke from experience.
When her father’s life was ending, the family asked for something they thought might be too much: to have all four generations at his bedside together.
“Nobody in the hospital flinched,” she said.
“They all said yes.” Children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren held his hand and prayed together.
“They wrapped us in compassion, dignity, and grace.”
The gift also honors the care her mother has received at Trillium Health Partners.
For the Myhals, this is a hospital that has looked after their family, not just a cause.
The money will go to one of the most ambitious health care building projects in Canadian history.
The redevelopment includes the Peter Gilgan Mississauga Hospital, the Shah Family Hospital for Women and Children, and the transformation of what will become the Gilgan Family Queensway Health Center.
Trillium Health Partners runs Credit Valley Hospital, Mississauga Hospital and Queensway Health Center.
It is already Canada’s largest community-based hospital network, serving a fast-growing, diverse population across Mississauga, West Toronto and the surrounding region.
Earlier this year, the Myhals toured the Trillium HealthWorks Experience Center, a full-scale mock-up of key spaces in the future hospital.
Rayla said the visit helped confirm their decision.
“Mississauga is not just a dot on a map for George and me,” she said.
“It’s actually a piece of who we are.”
The matching structure reflects how the Myhals think about giving.
They believe philanthropy works best when it moves others to act. Their $10 million is meant to bring in new donors alongside grateful patients, physicians, staff and volunteers.
“This $10 million is allocated as a match,” Rayla explained, “where we hope that community members, individuals, and businesses across Peel and the surrounding areas will step forward and invest in our collective future.”
Caroline Riseboro, president and CEO of Trillium Health Partners Foundation, called the gift “a catalyst” and said the community would rise to meet it.
She also called it “a powerful example of how faith, community, and philanthropy can come together for patients and families.”
Karli Farrow, president and CEO of Trillium Health Partners, thanked them simply: “Thank you for being builders.”
The approach is familiar to anyone who has followed the family’s giving.
In 2025, the Myhals made a $10 million matching gift to St. Joseph’s Health Center in Toronto’s west end.
It was the largest gift in the hospital’s history, designed to inspire $20 million in total community support.
Rayla sits on the St. Joseph’s Foundation board, and the family’s name is on the Myhal Family Birthing Center there.
Their health care giving also includes the Myhal Family Blood Collection/ECG Lab at Princess Margaret Cancer Center, the Myhal School of Nursing at Niagara College, and support for SickKids.
Education is the other pillar of their giving. George Myhal earned his industrial engineering degree at the University of Toronto in 1978.
His family had emigrated from western Ukraine, and he credits much of his success to the education that followed.
He went on to a nearly 40-year career at Brookfield Asset Management.
He and Rayla gave back to the university through the Myhal Center for Engineering Innovation & Entrepreneurship.
The eight-story building on St. George Street has prototyping labs, design studios, active-learning classrooms and space for student startups.
George chaired the engineering faculty’s fundraising campaign, served on the university’s Governing Council for more than a decade, and was named a Member of the Order of Canada in 2017, recognized in part for his support of engineering innovation.
U of T later gave him an honorary doctorate.
Rayla received the Engineering Alumni Network’s Honorary Alumna Award for her work advancing equity and access in STEM education.
Rayla’s own philanthropic life reaches well beyond hospitals and classrooms.
She is president and director of the Myhal Family Foundation and vice-chair of the board of The Royal Conservatory of Music.
She has supported the Conservatory for almost two decades, including as a scholarship patron of The Glenn Gould School, and helped make possible its student orchestra’s Carnegie Hall debut.
She chairs the Tryzub Awards Gala, which benefits Ukrainian charities. Through the foundation, she has helped mobilize humanitarian relief for Ukraine, including a $6 million pledge to the Canada-Ukraine Foundation and partnerships with GlobalMedic and Unite with Ukraine.
She also owns Featherstone Estate Winery in Niagara and has opened its doors to bring people together.
Throughout, she has said her goal is to help younger generations find meaningful ways to give back.
That is what the Trillium match is designed to do. It turns one family’s thanks into a reason for thousands of neighbors to give.
A patient speaker at the announcement, cancer survivor Aijaz Qureshi, described a hospital that has cared for three generations of his own family.
All seven of his grandchildren were born at Credit Valley.
“Health care is not just about medicine,” he said. “It’s about listening. It’s about kindness and honoring dignity.”
Rayla Myhal closed the event with an appeal her father would have recognized.
“Health care belongs to all of us,” she said.
“The care that saved or comforted your family yesterday, and mine, will be the care that saves somebody else’s family tomorrow.”