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Hundreds of people gathered in September at Baltimore's harbor as the wind gusted off the water's edge. Nearly 50 of them were about to be sworn in as U.S. citizens. Some were young, some old. There were uniformed members of the U.S. military, parents and children. There were immigrants from El Salvador, China, Honduras and countries in between. They raised their right hands, recited the naturalization oath to the United States, and were declared fully American.

The national conversation on immigration reform has been stalled for years, and while President Obama says it's a top priority for his second term, Baltimore is moving ahead with its own agenda: It's courting immigrants in an effort to revitalize its shrinking population.

Baltimore was once a major port city and destination for people moving to America. In 1950, nearly a million people lived here. Since then though, Baltimore has become known for high crime rates and abandoned homes. The city's population has fallen to just half of what it was in the 1960s.

Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake has a plan: She's looking to bring in 10,000 new families over the next decade, focusing on immigrants, a group that has helped other large cities grow. She's hoping new families will boost income and property tax revenue, helping to reignite the city's economy.

Zakaria al-Saghir is one of those new immigrants. He's originally from Iraq, and moved to Baltimore County with his wife and their three kids in September. Today he's in a small discussion group at Baltimore's International Rescue Committee, an organization that helps newcomers learn the ropes in the U.S. He's seated in a semi-circle with five other immigrants as their trainer, Sara Bedford, goes over everything from properly shaking hands, to filing taxes.

Enlarge Acacia Squires/NPR

Hundreds gather in Baltimore's harbor Sept. 22 to witness the naturalization of nearly 50 new Americans.

It's widely known as the fiscal cliff, but some prominent Republicans have been calling it a "debt crisis." Economists agree such a crisis may be coming, but it's not here yet. Demographic changes are forcing a reckoning of how to pay for what people want from their government.

President Barack Obama traveled to Redford, Mich., on Monday to carry on his campaign to cut a budget deal with House Republicans that includes raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans. He spoke to workers at a diesel facility.

The Orange Country Register in suburban Los Angeles is expanding its newsroom. Not only that — the owners are emphasizing print, not digital.

In the past few weeks, longtime Register editor Ken Brusic has hired some two-dozen positions: critics to review food, TV and cars, a society columnist and investigative reporters. He's still looking for a movie critic, a magazine writer and many more reporters.

"We haven't seen this kind of hiring since the early '90s," he says. That was before the digital age, when newspapers were still hugely profitable.

At the Register's headquarters, it sounds like a different era. The Register's presses whir nearly 24 hours a day.

They're printing more color, more pages: double the editorial section, two weekly high school sports sections and a new daily business section.

Brusic doesn't think people stopped subscribing to newspapers because they didn't want to read them. He thinks it's because publishers made too many cutbacks.

"They've been offering less and attempting, in some cases, to charge more for it. And people are smart. People won't put up for that sort of thing," he says. "So we're now offering more."

The Financial Puzzle

Brusic has been at the Register for more than two decades, much of which was marked by big layoffs.

Three years ago, the paper went into bankruptcy, but the changing economics of the industry were only part of the problem. The owners had saddled the paper with hundreds of millions in debt, and then cashed out.

The Two-Way

Murdoch's News Corp. Shuts Down 'The Daily'