A new business incentive the Center City Commission created a few months ago to support Downtown’s office market could be put into action soon.

The first potential recipient of money from the Center City Development Corp.’s commercial office grant program will come before the agency this morning.

Dr. Barbara Geater is the owner of a family medical practice at 2245 S. Lauderdale St. Established in 1947, Rentrop and Geater Family and Occupational Medicine is so busy today that patients are frequently turned away.

After deciding an expansion of the current office wasn’t feasible, Geater is planning to open a second location Downtown at 95 S. Main St., along what the CCC refers to as the Demonstration Block. Four or five people would staff the new office, and the plan is to begin seeing patients Dec. 1 or no later than Jan. 4.

The new space will cost more than $74,000 to remodel, so Geater applied to the Downtown agency for financial help.

The CCDC will vote today on approving a $7,500 commercial office grant for the business, which would be the first to receive that incentive from the board. The CCDC meeting starts at 9 a.m. at the CCC office, 114 N. Main St.

Under the new incentive program, eligible tenants may apply for reimbursement for tenant improvement costs, with the number of employees of the business determining how much money can be awarded. The grant program, which the CCDC created this summer, is one of several tax breaks and incentives the CCC and its affiliate boards rely on to prod business development Downtown.

Among the help that’s been especially well received lately is the group’s retail incentives, which small-business owners routinely say will help keep them going in the midst of the economic slump.

The CCDC set aside $350,000 for one year to fund the commercial office grant program, and will evaluate its progress once the first year is up. A draft outline of the program described it as designed to help stabilize Downtown’s office market by retaining and recruiting new full-time employees in the area.

What the program will do is allow Downtown office tenants who can’t afford – or whose landlords can’t afford – to pay tenant improvement costs to apply for a chunk of the $350,000.

Besides traditional family medicine, Geater’s practice will also offer executive medicine service and wellness classes. The executive service would include priority office visits, same-day service and even trips by a nurse practitioner to a patient’s business office to take care of their needs.

Geater also is planning wellness and disease-specific group classes that have an emphasis on preventative medicine, lifestyle changes and disease management.