Like mutant bumblebees, Downtown Partnership public safety guides will fan out across downtown beginning next month in hard-to-miss bright yellow polo shirts. Gone will be the white button-down shirts they've long worn.

"It's like the fire hydrant in front of your building -- when you see it every day, you don't see it anymore," said vice president Tom Yeager.

The updated uniform is only the most visible reminder to the public that, after a decade on the job, the mostly business-funded partnership is working to make the city's core cleaner and safer.

Other new measures include:

The addition of 16 more video cameras to monitor downtown streets, this time in the financial district, bringing the total to 64.

A $250,000 city-funded initiative to help shopkeepers improve store exteriors and to crack down on those who flout city codes.

And planned installation of signs directing pedestrians to tourist attractions and city landmarks.

The changes are good news to the business community.

"It's like Disney World," said Kemp Byrnes, a real estate broker and president of the Historic Charles Street Association. When you walk into the Florida theme park, he said, it "exudes a clean and safe environment"; the same should be true downtown.

Michele Whelley, the partnership's president, said the goal is simple -- feet on the street.

"We want people walking up and down the street," she said.

A key part of the equation is security, or sense of security, she said. The newly operational video cameras in the area bounded by Baltimore, Lombard, Calvert and Gay streets are meant to deter crime. The cameras are not monitored, but digital images can be reviewed after a crime.

The partnership teamed with Baltimore police, the Department of Public Works and the Abell Foundation to buy the $70,000 system. Downtown's first group of cameras went up along Howard Street in 1996, followed by Charles Street in 1999 and Park Avenue in 2001.

The partnership is also concerned with aesthetics. In addition to pushing streetscape improvements along Charles Street, it wants to see shops beautified using a carrot-and-stick approach.

The carrot will be the $250,000 grant, which merchants can tap for new windows, awnings and the like. The group may hire an expert to offer guidance on window displays, Whelley said.

The stick will be tougher enforcement of city codes. The partnership wants to hire an inspector to bring pressure on recalcitrant property owners.

Speaking of another initiative, Whelley said the pedestrian signs are long overdue. While some signs direct motorists to attractions, there are none aimed at visitors who may not know where to find, say, the Mount Vernon Cultural District.

She said signs could go up in the fall, emblazoned with the partnership's new green, blue and white logo showing landmarks such as the Shot Tower.

The yellow uniforms represent a change of direction. Originally, the white shirt and black pants were intended to resemble a police uniform. But Yeager said, "The bad guys -- they know we're not police officers."

So the emphasis is now on making the 45 summertime guides easier to spot for everyone from the tourist who can't find City Hall to the office worker who locked his keys in his car.

"We think visibility is more valuable than looking like police officers," Whelley said.

The Downtown Partnership runs a benefits district known as the Downtown Management District. Boundaries are roughly from President to Greene streets and from Centre to Pratt streets.

Property owners in the district pay a surcharge of 13.8 cents per $100 of assessed property value.