• The Associated Press, Monday, April 27, 2009 9:30 AM

CBS News is reviving its documentary series "CBS Reports." It will use the format for several stories on how the economic meltdown is affecting children. The network will report extensively on the topic for a week in May on its morning and evening newscasts, on "Face the Nation" and its Web site.

"We haven't done a real division-wide initiative for a while, and it was time to do it," says CBS president Sean McManus. On Saturday "CBS Evening News" was broadcast from Detroit, using the format. Other CBS platforms are working on their own stories. "CBS Reports" aired as a regular prime-time documentary from 1959 until 1971, with Edward R. Murrow's "Harvest of Shame" report about migrant workers one of its most remembered editions.

CBS' rivals have similarly tried to focus intensely on one story. ABC News devoted a week each spring for a couple of years to extensive reporting in Iraq about what the war has meant to that country's citizens. NBC News has played a part in its parent General Electric's companywide emphasis on going green.

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