on our broadcast tonight, drastic measures. one american city in such bad shape the mayor has cut all workers back to minimum wage just to stay afloat. will this now spread to other places? outside, is it the new normal? scorching heat, raging wild with fires, crippling drought. there's an indication the exeme weather we've seen recently may be just a preview of what's to come uchblgs revolution. what happened up in the sky 50 years ago tonight that changed our world forever. "nightly news" begins now. captions paid for by nbc-universal television good evening. from new york to los angeles,

from st. petersburg to seattle, there are services and facilities that we all grew up with that just aren't around any more because of budget cuts. because there's no money for them. in some places it's become dire. some communities have declared bankruptcy. others carry huge deficits. in scranton, pennsylvania, here's another extreme. the mayor there says to stay afloat financially, everybody db all municipal workers -- must take a pay cut down to minimum wage. that means, the mayor, police, fire, everybody. it's all part of a larger economic picture that was debated again on the campaign trail today. and we have two reports to start off with with here tonight, beginning with with nbc's ron allen in scranton. ron, good evening. >> reporter: good evening to you, brian. this battle was back in court today with the public employee's unions trying to force the mayor to pay them their full wages, guaranteed by their contract. we're talking about hundreds of firefighters, police and other city employees whose wages were

suddenly slashed to $7.25 an hour because the city says they simply just don't have the money. when scranton's rescue 1 answered the call today, firefighters had more on their minds than the usual hazards of the dangerous job. their pay has been cut by as much as 75% to minimum wage, $7.25 an hour. >> i can go down the street and scoop ice cream that a high schoolkid is doing for the summer making $8.50. i have firefighters running into burning buildings at $7.25 an hour, and police officers fighting with criminals in the street? ludicrous. >> reporter: a city that's no strange tore tough economic times and now faces 16 million $of red ink. mayor chris dougherty blames soaring health care costs, declining property taxes and little help from state and

federal government. the mayor slashed employee pay. the mayor says he just has no other option. the city is just out of money, they're facing a $16 billion deficit. it's difficult for them to borrow money from banks because of the situation they're in. he proposed say 78% property tax hike over the next four years the situation is so dire. we've seen other examples around the country of cities that for example are trying to target nonprofits like universities and hospitals to get them to pay higher fees, even the city baltimore, for example is thinking of putting logos, sponsorship on the side of fire engines to try to raise money. as you said, it's a situation that many cities and towns are facing across the country. >> ron allen starting us off tonight in scranton, pennsylvania. as we mentioned, this tough economy is what was on voter's minds today. as both president obama and mitt romney campaigned in key battlegrounds. white house correspondent kristen welker with us tonight

traveling with the president. cedar rapids, iowa. kristen, good evening. >> good evening to you, brian. things like iowa and colorado will make all the difference in november. the candidates continue to spar over who's best equipped to fix the economy. in ames, iowa, republican william buttermoore says he wants a change. >> it's a very, very slow recovery, if there's a recovery at all. >> he's going to vote for mitt romney. but less than five miles away, mike wright a democrat says he's worried romney would mishandle the fragile economy. >> i plan to attend a democratic local party meeting. >> president obama stumped in iowa today, while mitt romney took his campaign to colorado. >> this was a state that gave me a chance when nobody else would. >> we going to win here in november? >> trying to recapture that

momentum of 2008, mr. obama visited jason and ally mcglocklin whose support has never waivered. >> we couldn't be more proud to stand by our president once again. >> reporter: but a recent des moines register headline, some iowans say they regret backing obama in 2008, illustrates exactly why the president keeps returning here. the two candidates presented starkly different messages today. >> this week the president added insult to injury with another kick in the gut, by announcing that he has a plan, he said, to lower taxes for job creators and small businesses, he announced a massive tax increase. >> my opponent, his allies in congress, they sincerely believe the prosperity comes from the top down. >> reporter: in colorado, john puckett says with the unemployment rate stuck about 8%, romney has his vote.

>> we would like to see the economy turn around as fast as possible. >> reporter: but mom of three says the president is protecting middle class families. >> he's very responsive to families, especially middle class families, he's the right choice for president. >> reporter: polls show a tight race here in iowa and colorado. just as it is nationwide. so vote hes who live in these key battle ground states can expect to see a lot of these two candidates between now and november. >> kristen welker traveling with the president in cedar rapids, iowa tonight, thanks. it's brutally hot in the american southwest today. fires are still blazing in the rockies, and all the places where there isn't flash flooding. the midwest is struggling with with drought conditions, and the memory of last week's extreme heat wave is still fresh in the minds of millions of americans. and the word tonight from federal government weather experts, get used to it. our chief environmental affairs correspondent anne thompson is with us now from a fire charred section of colorado springs. anne, good evening. >> reporter: good evening,

brian. just consider this, june's extreme weather cost the u.s. almost $2 million. that's including the massive wildfire that happened here in colorado springs. that estimate comes from the insurance giant aon. and tonight we also have a warning from noaa, the national oceanic and atmospheric administration that once unusual weather is going to become more and more common. heat, fire and drought are familiar elements of most summers, but events in each case this summer are record breakers, due to climate change. >> the intensity and frequency is caused -- not in every case, but many cases by human activity, increasing greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere. >> reporter: gases like carbon dioxide created when we burn fossil fuel. in the state of the climate report released today no, one

noted significant changes at the ends of the earth in 2011. the south pole hitting an all time high of 9.9 degrees on christmas day. the arctic continued to warm at almost twice the rate of lower latitu latitudes, further is rinking the sea ice. >> all the ice reflects sunlight back to space. when the ice is gone, the sunlight that had been reflected back to space now is available to heat the earth even further. >> reporter: climate challenge scientists say is increasing the odds of such extreme weather, can't be blamed for every event. looking at some last year's extremes, researchers found no evidence climate change caused the defb statie devastating fl thailand. however, they say, our warming earth did play a role in the severity of the texas drought, caused in part by the cooler pacific waters of la nina, bringing dry conditions to the south. >> we should get used to these la nina related heat waves,

today they're 20 times more likely to occur than 50 years ago. >> reporter: now, government scientists say 2011 was cooler than 2010, but it was still warm enough to be one of the warmest 15 years on record. and with concentrations of greenhouse gases increasing, scientists say we should get ready for more extreme events. brian? >> anne thompson, colorado springs tonight, thanks for that. another example of extreme weather just this morning, just outside austin texas, ten inches of rain fell in a matter of just a few hours, touching off some nasty flash floods, leaving more than a dozen homes totally sur rounded by water. it was a good sides mess to clean up later in the day, luckily nobody was hurt. we have an update tonight on a story we aired just a few days back at the heat of those awful colorado wildfires. as we with reported that night, the firefighters in the fight are classified as seasonal workers by the federal government. so they have no health insurance. well, we have learned tonight

from the white house president obama is ready to issue an executive order that will allow those fire fighters to buy into a federal health insurance plan. a bill has also been introduced in the house and washington that would cover them as u.s. forest service employees. now, we turn to health news tonight. our chief medical editor dr. nancy snyderman has been reporting on this broadcast and "rock center" on a life or death challenge for people who are desperately ill, finding the right match for a potentially life saving bone marrow transplant. as she reports in her follow-up tonight, the struggle is extremely difficult when race is a factor. >> hi. >> hi, buddy. >> reporter: this 5-year-old is not your typical kindergartner. >> he was born with scott aldridge syndrome, an immune deficiency. >> reporter: doctors told the family their son's only hope for survival was a bone marrow

transplant. >> i'm japanese and kim's caucasian, which made it more challenging to find a match for fin. >> reporter: finding matches for mixed race kids is more difficult because their genetic make-up is different. a mere 4% of donors are of mixed race background. 7% are african-american, 7% asian, 10% hispanic. the majority, 71%, caucasian. luckily for the family, a donor was found for fin and he underwent a successful transplant. >> a year after he received his transplant, we held a registration event. >> reporter: with one simple swab of the cheek, they joined the donor registry. and then one day an unexpected but welcome letter came in the mail. >> i opened it up and i was shocked to say that i had been

mapped. it was almost like winning the lottery, actually. >> reporter: donating bone marrow today is a lot different than it was 25 years ago. most are done by a simple blood draw that collects blood stem cells. >> it really is not that inconvenient, and certainly not painful to help same someone's life. >> reporter: he did just that, save the life of a stranger, just as a stranger saved his son. >> no matter what race you are, why not register. but certainly, if you're of a different ethnic background or mixed, i think it would be all the more important. >> there are more than 10 million people on the national registry, but close to 50% of those when they're called to sign up and show up don't donate. it's a pool that obviously needs to be broadened with more minority and mixed race donors in our melting pot society. it's ongoing urgent problems. >> thank you for staying on this. by the way, the medical story we all woke up to this morning, said if you have a sedentary job, you're behind a desk, it

will shorten your life. and at our meeting in the newsroom today, you said that may be true. you didn't like the science. >> it's not a perfect story. it is the water cooler talk, and it really underscores the fact that a sedentary life can hurt you. sitting at your desk for more than three hows a day can shave two years off your life. and the two hours you may spend on the sofa, that can equal 1.5 years off your life. an important message that it's important, whether you're sitting at your desk or at home, get up every hour on the hour and get that circulation working. >> i plan to get up when we're done here tonight 37. >> excellent. you're only here for a half hour. why are some of america's superrich willing to leave the country and renounce their citizenship from a place that's been so good to them. later, the event that the changed everything 50 years ago tonight, and that includes what you're watching right now. all multivitamins give me the basics.

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while many americans are struggling to make ends meet, there is a growing trend among some of america's ultrawealthy, they're willing to give up their citizenship in many cases to save money and taxes. our report tonight from nbc's andrea mitchell. >> we know this saxophone has your name on it. >> reporter: a songwriter and philanthropist got the president of the united states, the first lady and michael jackson to headline her fund-raisers for cancer, honoring her daughter gabrielle who died leukemia. she supported the clinton campaign. just before leaving office, bill clinton faced a storm of criticism for pardoning her

former husband mark rich who fled prosecutors for tax fraud in 1983. >> just to be recognized by your peers is so wonderful. >> reporter: from politics to the grammys, denise rich always surrounded herself with superstars and the superrich. >> it's just a lot of funning and everyone has a lot of fun. >> reporter: now she's put her 5th avenue apartment on the market for $65 million. it's not only denise rich, facebook co-founder gave up his citizenship before the facebook ipo, he moved to singapore. why the trend? because an irs crackdown and to avoid estate taxes. >> they don't pay any estate tax when they die. this is a big concern to them, particularly for preserving family businesses. >> rich says she gave up her

status for her long time partner. >> you don't need to renounce your citizenship to be closer to your family. we all know the reason she's doing this, and it's to avoid paying taxes. i find the people who renounce their american citizenship despicable. >> reporter: whatever the reason, whose father escaped the holocaust and found refuge in the u.s. has now become a citizen of austria. still ahead, our first look ahead at how the u.s. team will look when the olympic opening ceremonies get underway in london. down here, folks measure commitment by what's getting done. the twenty billion dollars bp committed has helped fund economic and environmental recovery. long-term, bp's made a five hundred million dollar commitment to support scientists studying the environment. and the gulf is open for business - the beaches are beautiful, the seafood is delicious.

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it's now just 17 days away from lighting the caldron and starting the olympic games. and ralph lauren has unveiled the very sporty u.s. olympic team outfits for the opening ceremonies we sure hope everyone likes berets. in the town defiance toledo, they're talking about what may be the holy grail of baseball card discoveries of all time. carl was cleaning out his aunt's house, he found a cardboard box that belonged to his grandfather. inside hundreds of perfectly preserved baseball cards from 1910, including ty cobb, cy young and honus wagner. all the cards are real and could fetch up to $3 million at auction. a big anniversary to report tonight, spam is 75. let the celebrations begin for ham in a can, or something very close.

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finally tonight, this broadcast is brought to you by satellites. we're so used to them now, we've started saying via satellite, and those little word withes in the corner of the screen, we now just assume when something happens from cairo to cameroon to cleveland, ohio we will have live pictures of it instantly. but it's really only been that way for 50 years. in fact, it was 50 years ago this very day that the first satellite was launched. and it was called telstar and it changed everything. it weighed in at 170 pounds, was roughly the size a big beach ball, one those concert sized beach balls. there it is in the hands of scientists. it made an orbit of the earth

approximately every two and a half hours. it sailed up there for years. it's still up there tonight, it's just not operating any more. the first pictures showed americans seens from europe, including right there, big ben. and then a london bobby talking with some folks in london. while it may look in this era of high definition television like a kind of grainy black and white oil painting, at the time, as you see on the front page of "the new york times" they bragged the pictures were were clear from france. president kennedy used telis a to broadcast to european viewers one of his news conferences. it really became the first space aged global brand. there was a song called "telstar" by a british rock group. as can you tell, telstar became the modern design for soccer balls we use today. it's the 12th generation telstar

tonight circling the earth, and the very device that allows us to give you pictures like this, tahrir square live, cairo, coming to us from telstar 12. that is our broadcast for this tuesday night. thank you for being with us via satellite from our nbc headquarters in new york. i'm brian williams, we, of course, hope to see you right back here tomorrow evening. course, hope to see you right back here tomorrow evening. good night. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com