While keeping your firmware up to snuff is a good idea, it's not the cause of your problem. The City (and the county, by the way) are using a modulation scheme that most scanners don't like too much. Add to that the problem of simulcast distortion (trying to receive a digital signal from 2 or more towers), and the City can be very hard to hear depending on where you are.
We have an extensive thread on this in the Maryland forum, and here's the wiki on the subject...
Baltimore city Project 25 - the RR Wiki
In short, unless you're much closer to the city, you will likely have a hard time of it...Mike
