Anthony “Tony” Moiso, chairman and CEO of Rancho Mission Viejo LLC, declared his company’s commitment to the future of Providence Mission Hospital with a $50 million donation – the largest gift in the hospital foundation’s 33-year history.
“We’re investing in all the people that are here every day because we see what goes on here, and it’s really special,” Moiso told the Business Journal in an exclusive interview.
The landmark gift, announced today, will support Mission Hospital’s multiphase expansion plan that was first announced in 2022. It’s spending $712 million over seven years to expand its operations in South Orange County, including new clinics in San Clemente and Rancho Mission Viejo.
“We really want to put healthcare in those communities close to home,” Providence Mission Hospital Chief Executive Seth Teigen told the Business Journal.
In recognition, Mission Hospital is naming its new 100-bed hospital tower, expected to open in 2030, the Rancho Mission Viejo Family Tower.
The $50 million gift is a full circle moment for Rancho Mission Viejo, which in 1969 donated the land where Providence Mission Hospital sits on today.
Building 14K Homes on 6K Acres
Rancho Mission dates to 1882 when Moiso’s great-grandfather Richard O’Neill Sr. and James Flood purchased more than 200,000 acres of ranch land stretching from Saddleback Mountain to Oceanside.
In 1942, the U.S. Navy bought a portion of the land in San Diego County to establish Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton. The remaining 52,000 acres became known as Rancho Mission Viejo. Since then, three families – O’Neill, Moiso and Avery families – have kept control.
The arrival of the Santa Ana (5) freeway in the 1960s transformed a predominantly rural Orange County into a suburban destination.
“A lot of the Irvine family and the Moulton family were selling to developers, so we decided, with Don Bren’s encouragement, who was the first president of our development company, to be developers and to stay,” Moiso said.
Moiso, who served in the army and joined the family company as vice president in the mid-1960s, helped put together a large-scale master plan that included Saddleback Community College.
He said that his uncle Richard O’Neill was approached by several doctors to consider land for the hospital, which the company donated.
Over the past 60 years, Rancho Mission Viejo has been the master developer of cities and communities like Mission Viejo, Rancho Santa Margarita and Ladera Ranch.
It’s in the middle of developing Rancho Mission Viejo, a 23,000-acre property located about 10 miles southeast of Mission Viejo.
Homebuilders thus far have built about 7,000 homes, which is half of the 14,000 plots entitled for homes on about 6,000 acres. The remaining 17,000 acres is being preserved for a large habitat conservation area called The Nature Reserve and for ranching and farming.
The development ranked No. 1 among Orange County’s best-selling master planned communities, with 476 sales in 2024, according to John Burns Research & Consulting. See page 21 for the Business Journal’s annual list of homebuilders.
About 225,000 people live in some 75,000 homes in areas developed by the company, according to Rancho Mission Viejo Vice Chairman Don Vodra.
“We’re creating the demand, and we’re providing the supply,” he joked.
Seeing the ranch grow into a community of homes, hospitals and colleges is “incredibly rewarding,” according to Moiso.
“We’ve done a good job over the last more than half century helping create South Orange County, but it belongs to the residents,” he said.
“We’ve been beneficiaries of the growth of this hospital in many ways,” said Moiso, who is 85 years old.