President Barack Obama unveiled plans Wednesday to refocus spending of the federal government’s $700 billion financial bailout away from Wall Street’s big financial institutions and toward small businesses on Main Street.

Speaking from the warehouse of a storage company in Maryland, Obama said the initiatives would make it easier for smaller community banks to provide credit to small businesses, which have been hard-hit by the financial crisis, according an Associated Press report. The president’s plan also includes a request that Congress increase caps for existing Small Business Administration (SBA) loans.

“Over the past decade and a half, America’s small businesses have created 65 percent of all new jobs in the country,” Obama told a group of about 150 employees. “These companies are the engine of job growth in America,” he said. “They fuel our prosperity. And that’s why they have to be at the forefront of our recovery.”

The plan includes:

– Steps to improve access to credit for small businesses by supporting lending by small banks and Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs) through the Financial Stability Plan. This new initiative will support small business lending by providing lower-cost capital to small banks that present small business lending plans and to CDFIs that lend to small businesses in the hardest-hit rural and urban areas.

– Legislation to increase the maximum size of 7(a) loans used to purchase machinery, equipment, land and buildings from $2 million to $5 million; increase the maximum size of 504 loans, which are used to support real estate purchases, to $5.5 million; and increase the maximum size of SBA microloans from $35,000 to $50,000 to give a boost to start-ups and other smaller businesses.

The president called on Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and SBA Administrator Karen Mills to convene a conference of regulators, congressional leaders and small business owners to establish further steps the government can take to help small businesses access credit.

The administration was not prepared to place a cost on the small-bank assistance program. An administration official said the Treasury Department wanted to consult with small banks to determine what the level of participation might be. The program would tap money still available in the $700 billion rescue fund.

The fund, known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program, is set to expire at the end of the year. The administration, however, could ask for an extension until next October. Bank industry officials say the small bank program would have to extend into next year to function.

A fact sheet on the president’s small business lending initiatives can be viewed byclicking here.