Retiring soon? Well, if you're a city councillor, don't expect the city to pay for your farewell cake if deputy mayor Doug Holyday has his way. Expected in two weeks is a report by Holyday recommending a new system that would curb the spending of city councillors' annual $30,000 budget. Holyday wants to ban everything from taxpayer-funded donations and goodbye parties to alcohol and personal improvement courses (remember Adam Giambrone's French lessons?). A spokesperson for Mr. Ford said the Mayor was "fully supportive" of Mr. Holyday's strategy.

It's the new trend for hospitals. In a move to improve care and cut costs, University Health Network plans to join with Toronto Rehabilitation Institute, which treats patients from Toronto's largest hospitals — St. Michael's, Mount Sinai and Sunnybrook. Joining forces will help all hospitals move their patients more quickly and easily into rehab, which will ease the heavy traffic in emergency rooms of those waiting to be admitted. Also announced was the merging of two GTA hospitals, Trillium Health Centre and Credit Valley Hospital, who also claimed that they can provide patients with better quality care by joining forces.

The Beach Bandits have been caught. Police have laid 57 charges against two Toronto residents, a common-law couple, for a series of break-and-enters in the Beach that go back from 2009. The most recent break-in was Saturday. Police were able to recover a large quantity of stolen property, including coins, jewelery, electronics, tools and bicycles.The investigation is ongoing and police are making efforts to return the stolen goods to the rightful owners.

At yesterday's graffiti removal photo op, Rob Ford seemed to hint that Queen Street's graffiti alley was slated for a a clean-up. Or perhaps he's not even familiar with the Toronto landmark (watch the video). Either way, Municipal Licensing and Standards say that the alley is safe. "We know the significance of that lane... what we're going to try to do, either through an approval process, something to entrench it, [is] to make sure that it is, if necessary, protected in the future," said Lance Cumberbatch, director of investigative services at MLS.

IN BRIEF:

• Harper to unveil full platform today in the GTA
• Would you watch a 24 hour movie at TIFF?
• Jays lose to As

Photo by toronto.pictures in the blogTO Flickr pool.