BATON ROUGE — Southern community leaders from four states kicked off the annual conference Destination Downtown on Wednesday in Baton Rouge. 

The conference, focusing on redeveloping and supporting downtown areas, is being held at Louisiana's Old State Capitol building until Friday. The event features guests from four Southern states and is hosted in partnership with Louisiana Main Street, Main Street Arkansas, Mississippi Main Street Association and Main Street Alabama. 

Guests and speakers discussed strategies on how to revitalize downtown areas throughout the South.