OGDENSBURG — One of the huge buildings at the Ogdensburg Bridge and Port Authority’s Commerce Park is being refitted to house something small.

Though Building 1 is a 30,000-square-foot manufacturing or warehousing facility, the authority is transforming it into a small-business incubator.

“We haven’t had a lot of people knocking on our door looking for 5,000 to 6,000 square feet,” said Wade A. Davis, the authority’s executive director. “We want to rent out the building in a way that makes sense.”

The space sets itself apart from like facilities by giving companies room to grow from small offices of just a couple of hundred square feet into larger enterprises housing dozens — or scores — of workers.

“The thought is that these businesses, as they move in and evolve, will need additional space,” Mr. Davis said. “We’re trying to learn from past situations.”

Mr. Davis’s strategy has evolved from one that tries to attract a large company and major employer to another that tries to cultivate and nourish growing businesses.

“These are businesses that will hopefully site here and expand,” said Mr. Davis. “There’s value in that for us.”

When presenting the idea to the authority’s board of directors, however, Mr. Davis faced some criticism.

“Your business plan is to divide this building up piece by piece,” board Chairman Samuel J. LaMacchia said. “So you aren’t thinking someone who is going to need a big box is coming in any time soon.”

Other members of the board of directors complained that the authority would be responsible for power, heat and maintenance of the unoccupied and common areas of the building.

In the past, many of the Commerce Park tenants have started in small offices and later moved to larger facilities, Mr. Davis said. A building dedicated to small business could prevent smaller offices from carving up other empty space in the park.

Currently, the building houses offices for AB Technology Group, Ontario Gasket Inc., Sehco and Corning Inc. in spaces ranging from 108 to 1,588 square feet.

Mr. Davis told the board that two more clients were interested in the building’s office space.

The building will become the third small-business incubator in St. Lawrence County, after Clarkson University’s Shipley Center for Innovation and SUNY Canton’s Small Business Development Center.

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