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Although it covers four blocks in the heart of the city, most people don’t know the Smithville Downtown Heritage District exists.

But Harley Morlock, president of the Smithville Downtown Heritage District Board, said the group is trying to change that.

“We’re trying to present the downtown businesses and let people know that we’re here,” he said. “Smithville is kind of a bedroom community and people don’t come downtown often, so we’re trying to educate local people on the heritage district and downtown and get the word out to non-Smithville people to come downtown, too.”

The district, reorganized in 2004 by the Smithville Downtown Heritage District Board, is bounded on the east and west by Mill Street and Commercial Street and on the north and south by the Little Platte River and Meadow Street.

Morlock said the group restarted the district to promote downtown businesses in an attempt to attract more people to the area. But, so far he said it’s not working very well.

“We haven’t been as successful as we’d like to be,” he said. “We have hundreds and hundreds of cars going north and south on 169 Highway but we still get people down here weekly who say, “we didn’t know you were here.’ And it’s not just people from out of town, it’s people in town as well.”

One of the main problems with the district, Morlock said, is the lack of retail like boutiques and clothing stores. Because they aren’t there, Morlock said, most people do their shopping elsewhere and skip the district entirely.

But, for the moment, it’s a bit of a catch-22.

“We have several plans for what we’d like to do but we can’t get enough people down here to support a retail store, but we need the store to attract the people,” he said.

In addition to trying to attract new retail tenants, Morlock said the district is also seeking additional signage.

According to Cherrine Wheeler, a member of the Smithville Downtown Heritage District Board, the group is looking into acquiring metal street signs to place on the light poles throughout the district. Although the signs are not currently allowed in city code, Wheeler said she’s working with the city to change the code and she hopes to start working on the signs by January.

The signs, Wheeler said, will be sponsored by local businesses and will be modeled after the downtown heritage district signs in use in Juneau, Alaska.

While it may seem like a small feat, Wheeler said 70 percent of the people she talks to on a daily basis have no idea what the heritage district is and the signs should alleviate that.

“They’ll know where they are and know that this is something special,” she said. “The signs are going to catch their attention and create some traffic down here.”

Beyond that, Morlock said the group is also looking into starting monthly festivals downtown and anything else that will drive traffic to the district.

“There’s no magic bullet out there,” he said. “I wish there was, but there isn’t.”

Staff writer Michael Westblade can be reached at 389-6636 or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

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