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The city of District Heights hopes to improve community aesthetics with a streetscape improvement project in October featuring new landscaping and sidewalks in the Marlboro Pike business district.

The project would put new shrubs outside businesses between the 6000 and 6400 blocks of Marlboro Pike in incorporated District Heights. The project also includes continuous sidewalks along the same corridor.

"Right now it's really not a lot of sidewalk there which doesn't make it safe for people to walk up and down," Mayor James L. Walls Jr. said.

A total of $245,000 in Prince George's County Community Development Block Grant money will cover all of the landscaping and sidewalk construction, Walls said.

CDBG money, which was awarded to District Heights this spring, is given to local jurisdictions for community improvement projects. The project could begin as early as October and Walls hopes it will wrap up by December.

"I think what it will do is make our business district more enticing for people to want to come and patronize our businesses in the downtown section of our city," Walls said.

The City Commission needs to review plans for welcome signage during the Sept. 28 work session before the entire streetscape plan gets his and the City Commission's final approval, Walls said.

There are 90 businesses between the 6000 and 6400 blocks of Marlboro Pike, said Samantha Archibald, District Heights' urban planner.

The project follows the business façade renovation project for the 6300 block of Marlboro Pike which was completed in late 2009, Archibald said. The $1.1 million project, funded with a combination of CDBG, state Legacy grant and Housing and Urban Development Economic Development Initiative monies included a parking lot resurfacing and new signage.

While Mona Smith, owner of the Stylez salon in the 6300 block, appreciates the façade renovation and the need for sidewalks, she said the bigger issue is day-to-day upkeep of the business property. Smith, who has been in District Heights for 10 years, said wants to see the property kept clean and she wishes the parking lot was larger.

"Although they resurfaced it, if a pot hole comes it stays and it gets bigger and bigger," Smith said. "They do it and then they let it go right back down. There's no upkeep on everything."

Walls said it is a business owner's responsibility to maintain their property but that the city will still send its public works officials out on occasion to do property maintenance.

"I think sometimes the owners don't understand that that is part of their responsibility," Walls said. "It would be the same as if for homeowners. You're responsible for cutting your grass and keeping your property clean."

nmcgill@gazette.net