been as many as 400 employees fired if not for the furlough plan. >> this gap that we have to face and decisions we have to make really impacts all of us. >> reporter: city employees will be forced to take at least five designated holidays without pay or up to 10 if they make over $100,000. maybe employees will -- many employees will not talk publicly about the plan but robert gibson who works in fleet management says he agrees with the temporary pay cut. >> in these times i would rather do that than see somebody get laid off. during the tough times everybody's got to, you know, do their part. >> reporter: but the president of the city's fire department union says his members have done enough and more cuts would jeopardize the public safety. today five positions were eliminated from the department. >> i'm not saying we should be exempt from anything. i'm saying we've already suffered our cuts. we have four companies closed on a rotating basis everyday

now. >> reporter: the city is still negotiating a plan with police and fire departments on possible furlough days and additional cost-saving cuts. the department of recreation and parks is also feeling the cuts. seven employees, primarily supervisors, are being eliminated, accounting for nearly $500,000. a spokesperson for the department says the work will be picked up by the remaining employees. health, housing and contractual positions within the police department round out the 27 layoffs and this may only be the beginning. in downtown baltimore, cheryl conner, abc2 news. >> the board of estimates will meet again october 21st to hammer out the details with the firefighters and police. coming up at 6:00, why the city's biggest union chief says the mayor missed opportunities to save thousands of dollars. and the city state's attorney's office feeling the pinching. patricia jessamy said today her office has 20 unfilled

positions including 10 prosecutors and 10 support staff. her office will take furlough days as well and she says this means over the next nine months beginning october 1st and each day the courts are open through june 30th, we'll have about nine fewer prosecutors on duty and five less support staff. she says all courts will be fully operational and she will reassign staff to cover the courtroom vacancies. law enforcement across the country remains on heightened alert following that suspected terror plot in new york city. the homeland security secretary janet napolitano says we must remain vigilant in the face of security threats. she was in baltimore today. kelly swoope joins us to explain why. >> reporter: i will tell you, there was very little information about the suspected plot to build bombs and attack locations in the u.s. but secretary napolitano says protecting our ports, to people at football stadiums, we must remain vigilant. the secretary was in touch with dutch ruppersberger and

governor martin o'malley announcing00's of thousands of -- hundreds of thousands in grants to go to the port of baltimore. it would improve our emergency response capabilities. najj azazi remains in jail in new york. the secretary wasn't willing to release many details. >> right now on the matter we have no information on the timing, location or target of a specific attack. but given recent events across the federal government we've been working very closely sharing information and coordinating resources to ensure we're doing everything possible to keep americans safe. >> reporter: one way they will be doing that is by enhancing security. napolitano says some of the funding we receive today will go towards a new program that makes sure all port workers

with access to secure areas have a background check done on them. kelly swoope, abc2 news. foreclosure proceedings have begun at the first mariner tower. an auction for the building and surrounding land is scheduled for october 21st. it comes after hale defaulted on a $40 million loan. we spoke with the ceo yesterday and he says he's considering several options to come up with a quick resolution to the problems. he also reassures all first mariner bank customers that business will go on as usual. parts of dundalk are finally dry tonight including the logan village shopping center. it was almost ground zero after five days of dealing with a wet mess from friday's watermain break people are back out and about. we stopped into a few businesses to see how they are holding up. pete's barber shop, for example, has customers in its chairs again. the owner tells us the biggest hit he took was saturday, they

couldn't open because there was still no water. captain harvey's is back to making the monster subs. they were able to reopen saturday but say business was slow. as for that massive hole, work is going on 10 hours a day to get it fixed. >> what we're going to do next is once we get that section of pipe out of there and it's safe and drained thoroughly then we'll do inspection in the line. we'll be looking at the entire section that is shut off which is 15,000 feet. so that's, what, 2 3/4 miles, quite a long way. >> big job. we're told a section of the pipe should be out by friday or possibly monday. city police shot a -- a man is shot by police and in critical condition after waving a spatula at officers. it happened in the 2400 block of bridgehampton drive 6:00 this morning. 911 received a suicide call at

that draws but when help arrived they encountered a man who seemed to be wielding a dangerous weapon. abc2 news brian kuebler joins us live with how this happened. >> reporter: the police say the man made a call for help only to get belligerent prompting officers to shoot. paramedics and police arrived after receiving a suicide call. they said it looked like he was waving a sharp object at the paramedics. he ignored the plea from officers to stop coming toward them. that's when he was shot several times. neighbors awokened by the scene. >> i heard three or four gunshots. woke me up out of sleep this morning. i looked out the window, i seen about seven, eight police cars and ambulance. >> reporter: the weapon turned out to be just a spatula but in the dark and at a distance police had to make a split-second decision. the two officers will be placed on routine administrative leave. according to the department this is the 13th

police-involved shooting this year down from 21 last year. live in studio, brian kuebler, abc2 news. to an abc2 news exclusive from towson. sources tell us the suspect stole a car and became nervous when he saw police a little after 4:00 this morning on york road. this is right in front of towson university. that's when the suspect floored it, hit the wall and crashed. the driver was not hurt and boy, he was arrested. an elderly woman is in the hospital after a fire in baltimore county. the fire started just before 10:00 this morning on osbourne avenue in catonsville. the building houses multiple apartments. the woman was taken to shock trauma and is expected to be ok. authorities say the fire started in the kitchen but they don't yet know what caused it. a pennsylvania state panel has found probable cause of racial discrimination by suburban philadelphia swim club. the ruling by the pennsylvania human rights commission follows an incident in june when the valley club told a day camp of mostly african-american

children they could not swim. the club says safety and crowding, not race, prompted them to cancel the contract and return the camp's money. the commission ordered the club to pay as much as $50,000 for humiliation and embarrassment to a black family that filed the complaint. the club's lawyer blames the ruling on a media firestorm. president barack obama says help is on the way to georgia. as floodwaters recede in the metro atlanta area thousands of people are returning to their waterlogged homes. i guess they've had massive fires there, too. at least 10 people died in the deluge. the latest now from t.j. >> reporter: as the floodwaters recede in georgia they reveal a muddy mess. bill howell had put all his furniture up on paint buckets. >> we've done everything we can possibly do and we thought we were doing right. we never seen anything like this. >> reporter: it's the human loss that has taken a real

toll. the floods are being blamed for 10 deaths across the southeast. one drowning victim was a mother of two driving home from the night shift when her mini van was swept away. she called 911 as the water rose to her neck. >> it's getting up and i'm going to drown. >> listen to me, you're not going to drown. work with me. >> i'm going to drown now. >> just stay on the phone with me. i'm going to stay with you. >> reporter: metro atlanta students were back in class today but clarksdale elementary school in austell was closed again. on monday that building was submerged in the storm. >> the school has been there 50 years or more. it was very special for the kids in the neighborhood. >> reporter: most of the roads and freeways swamped just a short time ago have reopened including a busy stretch of i-20 in atlanta. stressed out bridges remain a concern. in fact the popular peachtree dunwoody bridge will be closed for two weeks for repairs. >> in its current status if you

were to have a heavy vehicle turn over you have a good chance of bringing the bridge down. >> reporter: health experts are telling all residents to treat the floodwater as if it's contaminated, that means frequent hand-washing and plenty of cleaning in the days ahead. abc news, austell, georgia. it may have been cloudy in some places but very dry around here and very humid. wyatt has the first forecast. >> a little ironic. here we are in the first days of fall and all the weather seems to be headed in the opposite direction. temperature well into the low and mid-80s with sunshine and on top of that the humidity, just way up there. it's a steam bath outside. let's look at some of the numbers. 83 the current at bwi marshall but hotter weather off to the west. look at hagerstown, pushing 90. same deal in winchester. this is unseasonable, not recordbreaking but we've seen 90s at this time of year before but it's still muggy. couple of showers lining up across western maryland pushing

in towards the hagerstown area now but these are probably going to fizzle out before coming our way. i'll take the showers out for tonight, call it partly cloudy, muggy and sultry in the city. more on the forecast as we go to the next few days here because there's even more heat to come, and a big drop in the temperatures. we'll talk about that in a few. the theater on the campus of the university of maryland college park is closing. the university's newspaper says student union officials will close the theater which was involved in controversy when it screened a porn movie in april. instead it will represent the space to university-based groups and outside organizations to use as an auditorium. the change will take place in january. diabetes, doesn't just hit overweight people or the elderly. there are teens dealing with it, too. for example, nick jonas from the jonas brothers has diabetes and is now helping other young people with the disease.

tense moments for a reporter in georgia when a garage explodes, in the middle of an interview. watch what happens. can i get you a snack? that's what i do for my son's friends, i get them snack. do you like crackers with peanut butter on them? >> i hope this is not too forward coming here. >> "cougartown" goes on the prowl tonight. what is a cougar anyway. ? the temperatures in oriole park, 82 degrees. 85 today. wyatt has the full forecast coming up. (announcer) if you think all batteries are the same, consider this:

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"2 your health" -- one in 300 teens has diabetes. nick jonas is a diabetic who sings about his illness. and in today's "health minute," the doctor talks to him.

>> reporter: a rock star that sings about life, love, and diabetes. 17-year-old nick jonas, youngest of the famous jonas brothers, was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes four years ago. >> i lost 15 pounds in a total of three weeks. >> reporter: nick's song is aimed at helping teens with diabetes who can feel stigmatized. >> having anything different and particularly a chronic illness sets you apart and many, many of these teenagers feel it. >> reporter: nick is also a paid spokesperson for bayer which makes a device for monitoring blood glucose levels. he watches what he eats, wears an insulin pump and checks his blood sugar 10 to 12 times a day but at times his brothers do have to cover for him. >> there have been times that i needed more time to take care of the low blood sugar. >> reporter: when his readings are healthy again he

gets back to doing what he loves. >> just the fact that i can say, look, you can do what you want do do and do it with diabetes. that's the best thing in the world. >> reporter: for today's "health minute," i'm dr. sanjay gupta. call me wimpy but i put the air on today. it was a little too sticky. i thought those days were over. >> i wouldn't call you wimpy. >> thank you. i wouldn't call you wimpy. it feels more like a summer day. it's like winding back to august as we go to the fall. it will only last another day or two though. if you like the warm stuff savor it. the plunge is coming. let's look outside now. we've got a pretty balmy temperature. humidity 68%. dew point way up there, just a

ton of moisture in the air. yeah, kind of bad hair day weather. we've got a southeast wind around 8 miles per hour helping to pull that warm and humid air and from the south and southeast. right now not much on maryland's most powerful doppler radar. you have to go way west, west of harrisburg, west of hagerstown to find much in the way of precipitation. here's a look at the temperatures now. they've dropped off a little bit but what you don't see in the numbers of course is the humidity which is quite high right now. in fact the dew point number up around 70. those are basically summer-like humidity readings. it's a steamy scenario and it will continue another 36 hours or so before i think the humidity will begin to fall off into the afternoon tomorrow and into the evening tomorrow night. temperatures now, again, 80 in baltimore. 812 in hand -- 82 in hanover. low temperatures, not very low, in fact we were only down just below 70. in the high country, hagerstown, ocean city, dover,

only in the 70s overnight. this is not very seasonable stuff, above average temperatures in the afternoon as well. flirting with 90 degrees off to our west. that is unseasonable, not recordbreaking but certainly a lot warmer than average throw in the humidity and it feels a lot more like the upper 80s. the kind of air you can cut with a knife. we have clearing now across central maryland. i think we'll seep sunshine around through the rest of the evening. sunset just after 7:00 p.m. so days are definitely getting shorter even with the warm weather around. take you out a little wider view and not a tremendous amount going on here weatherwise but we are beginning to see some colder air pulling up in the southern plains of canada. cool front beginning to form, it will sweep down across the eastern seaboard, as we move toward the weekend. i think as we go towards saturday we may not get out of the 60s. so it will feel a lot more like fall in a couple of days. right now it's certainly a hot and steamy afternoon across maryland and it will be the

same deal tomorrow, maybe even a little warmer. forecast in detail, not picking up on a lot of rain, the chance for a scattered shower into thursday and friday but not much precipitation. in fact friday i think we'll see a lot of sunshine but you'll feel the humidity drop friday and it will be a cooler forecast into the weekend. high tide tomorrow, 10:14 a.m., sunset just after 7:00. partly cloudy, muggy, sultry night. tomorrow, clouds, maybe some showers late in the day, 83 for a high. 7-day forecast, again, one more summerlike day, then things start to feel a lot more like fall. we cool off friday, 74. bring in the chance of rain this weekend, cown into the 60s. then we go back up. a little of everything in the 7-day forecast. forget monica gellar, courteney cox is back with "cougartown." her new character is nothing like what you remember from "friends." joce sterman talked with cox to

talk about what it really means to be a cougar and why there's a label out there for all of us ladies. >> you see that young gentleman there? love to lick his body. >> that's my son. >> reporter: courteney cox is back and on the prowl. this time playing newly divorced mom jewel in "cougartown." don't let that clip fool you. cox says you might be getting the wrong idea. >> i think it's a woman in her 40s that, like you said, has the knowledge and experience and confidence to be able to go out with someone younger and teach them things. >> it's a role she's comfortable playing considering she has seven years on hubby david arquette. but with "cougartown" her character comes to terms with being single in totally different times. >> she's trying to get back out there and learn how to not just stay home and play scrabble. >> reporter: she gets a little nudge into the dating pool from her friends and from a hunky next door neighbor also recently divorced. he has her character on the offensive proving she's still got what it takes. >> hey, kids!

ow! >> reporter: she says the character is feisty and fresh, a relatable woman dealing with her own issues as she tries to raise a son and find her own way. being called a cougar is nothing but a label. >> if you're in your 30s you're a puma. if you're in your 40s, you're a cougar, if you're in your 50s, jaguar. >> reporter: with cougartown abc is saying welcome to the jungle. joce sterman, abc2 news. >> i wish i was still a puma. "cougartown" airs tonight at 9:30 on abc2. you can't miss "dancing with the stars" either tonight. last night turned out to be a tear-jerker. we wrap up with who cried, cried who surprised and who disappointed.

and wii prices about to take a dive. find out how much. excuse me, mary?

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to make them more comfortable while you eat. i can eat my steak, i just love it. (charlie dullea) try super poligrip. good evening. i'm kelly swoope, new at 5:30 -- an attempted abduction in anne arundel county as a woman tries to walk away with a 4-year-old boy at the bus stop. plus, the outside of the hospital looked more like tent city as the emergency personnel tried to keep people with the swine flu away from other patients. and reaction from this year's "dancing with the stars" contestants just hours before the first team is voted off. and wyatt is back with the forecast. on abc2 news in 5:30. in two minutes. in atlanta, a reporter covering flooding almost became part of the story.

a garage exploded while he was interviewing a person with his cell phone camera. the explosion blew the garage door off and hurled it almost 30 feet. the reporter called police, firefighters were able to stop the fire from spreading and amazingly no one was hurt. one person was killed and another seriously hurt after a school bus crash in phoenix. police say the bus and a car collided at an intersection, it appears the bus is completely on top of the car. a person in the car was killed. the other is in serious condition. the bus driver was the only one on the bus at the time. go, go! don't stop! >> residents running away from the flames, at least 1,000 homes are threatened and one college in the area closed. the winds are expected to pick up to make it harder to fight the fire. four firefighters were treated and released for smoke and heat-related injuries. good news for anyone that

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