Photo: "Red Fragment" by blogTO Flickr pooler PDPhotography.

Your morning news roundup for Monday, March 3rd, 2008:

The coming of the month of March hopefully signals the coming of warmer weather. The cold and the snow hasn't only been bad for your bones, but apparently they've been bad for the environment because of the cheap salt used by the City of Toronto. 135,000 tonnes of cheap salt.

With the City using environment-destroying salt everywhere, it's comforting to know that at least places like Woodbine Racetrack are doing what they can to go green and save energy. Almost makes me want to head down to the slots and spend some money. Almost.

Of course, violent carjackings affecting senior citizens at the mall across the street doesn't really help Woodbine's image.

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It may not be the ten dollars some have been hoping for, but the province is set to increase the minimum wage to $8.75 at the end of this month. I don't know much about the minimum wage debate in Ontario, so I'll let you, our astute readers, weigh in and let me know if this is a good move.

When I think of retail stores that make me feel safe and comforted, flower shops generally come to mind. So you can imagine my shock and horror when I learned that a florist was killed in a robbery this past Friday.

Conrad Black reports to a Florida prison later today, ending months of legal proceedings and overexposure in Canadian media. (And yes, I know I'm not helping by posting about this here either.)

Bill Clinton was in Toronto to speak at a fundraiser for his Clinton Giustra Sustainable Growth Initiative on Saturday night, while his wife made a special appearance on Saturday Night Live at the same time. Seems to me that Hillary got the more fun end of the deal.

With our film industry already struggling in Toronto, you'd figure the federal government would stay away from introducing bills that would cancel tax credits for films and TV shows they find offensive. The supply of locally-produced slash and gore is about to get much smaller.