The South Bayview Bulldog

Torstar , the publisher of the Toronto Star, is offering immediate buyouts to editorial staff and plans to outsource ad-building, layout and editing duties, three Star journalists told Reuters today. The Star, Canada’s biggest daily newspaper, wants to offer immediate layoff packages, reporter Richard Brennan wrote on his Twitter account. A second source, who declined to be identified, said the newspaper was planning a “major trim” of staff to be completed by the end of the year. The company has confirmed the buyout offer but said departures will be voluntary. It said it did not have a number for how many employees would take the offer.

TPS report: Sunnybrook Health Science Centre, 2075 Bayview Avenue, reports that between 1230 hours, June 2, 1011 and 1558 hours, November 9, 2011, unknown suspect(s) removed an Echo Transesophogeal Probe from the premises. (This device is a kind of uttrasound, according to Wikipedia — Ed).

Mayor Ford said today that it’s time for the Occupy Toronto encampment to leave St. James Park and “move on.” His remarks follow a successful move by London, Ontario police to remove a similar community in a local park. They arrived in large numbers and firmly removed all tents and structures. No one was injured. Ford stressed he was not announcing a decision nor speaking on behalf of the police chief.

Toyota said today it is recalling about 550,000 cars globally because of certain steering related issues, which are making the vehicles harder to steer. Dion Corbett, a spokesman for Toyota said that this recall will affect 25,000 in New Zealand and Australia, 447,000 vehicles in North America and also 38,000 cars in Japan. Most of the vehicles that are being recalled are from the United States. Also included in the recall are 14,000 vehicles in Asia excluding Japan along with some 14,000 in Europe and another 14,000 in the Middle East.

Welcome to Toronto. As many as 50 Hungarian Roma a day are filing refugee claims at Pearson airport, putting a strain on airport staff and medical services, according to border services officials, the Toronto Sun reports. A record 110 claimants arrived at the airport one night last week, creating a challenge for immigration and security personnel working to process them, officers say. Entire Roma families, from babies to grandmothers, are getting off flights and claiming refugee protection at Pearson, alleging they’re being persecuted by “skinheads or Neo-Nazis” in their homeland, border officers said. A similar influx of Roma’s from the Czech Republic led to Canada imposing visas on all Czech citizens.

Toronto Police Service: A resident of Woodlawn Avenue West reports that between 1815 hours and 2145 hours, November 5, 2011 entry was gained into the premises by forcing a door. Removed were two laptop computers, a set of car keys and a quantity of cash and jewellery.