WASHINGTON — President Obama met with community bankers Tuesday in the White House and absolved them of blame for the financial crisis. But they didn’t get off scot-free, as the president suggested they weren’t lending enough.

A little more than a week after calling executives of large financial institutions “fat-cat bankers” who helped trigger the country’s economic troubles, the president was much kinder to a dozen small banks. But he delivered the same message — albeit in a nicer tone — as he did to the gathering of big-bank chieftains: Make more loans to small businesses to help create jobs.

“I think it’s fair to say that most of these community banks were not engaged in some of the hugely risky activities that helped to precipitate the financial crisis,” Obama told reporters at the end of the meeting with bankers from states such as Illinois, Wisconsin, New Mexico and New York.

Although he praised community banks for doing their part to help their cities and towns recover from the recession, the president said they needed to go further to get small businesses the money they need to start hiring again.

“The president’s message today was that they’re listening,” said James D. MacPhee, chief executive of Kalamazoo County State Bank in Michigan. “They know that the community banks of this nation did not create this train wreck.”

The country’s 8,000 small banks might not have caused the problem, but they are a key to helping the economy recover.

Despite accounting for only 12 percent of all bank assets, community banks make nearly one-third of all loans of less than $1 million to small businesses, according to the Independent Community Bankers of America.

“The bread and butter of community banks is small-business lending,” said Paul Merski, chief economist for the trade group, which represents about 5,000 banks.

Like big banks, however, small banks have cut back on lending as they have struggled with fallout from the financial crisis and recession.

Business loans on the balance sheets of all federally insured U. S. banks fell $89.1 billion, or 6.5 percent, from July 1 to Sept. 30, according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. That was part of a $210 billion drop in overall loans outstanding, the largest such decline since at least 1984.

“In some ways, the pendulum may have swung too far in the direction of not lending, after a decade in which it had gone way too far in the direction of getting money out the door, no matter the risk,” Obama said. “If we can get that balance right, . . . there are businesses and communities out there that are ready to grow again.”

The bankers at the meeting cited increased regulator constraints as one reason for not lending more. Federal regulators have been pressing all banks to hold on to more capital to cover potential losses.

While noting that regulators are independent and don’t report directly to the White House, Obama said his administration was looking at ways to “cut some of the red tape.”

Edward L. Yingling, president of the American Bankers Association, which represents small and large banks, echoed comments about toughened regulatory standards.

“In many cases, bank examiners are exercising more caution when reviewing bank lending portfolios. This is understandable given the recent financial crisis,” Yingling said. “Yet the bank regulators need to be prudent without being so punitive that they choke off lending in communities across the country,”

William Ruberry, a spokesman for the Office of Thrift Supervision, said regulators were trying to avoid a repeat of the risky loan practices that led to the financial crisis.

“We want loans to be made, but we want them to be good loans,” he said. More banks are being told to increase their capital reserves, he said, since more of them have troubled portfolios because of the recession.

But factoring in the tougher regulation and the difficulty of making sound loans in a rough economy, community banks are finding it very difficult to lend, Merski said.

Community bankers have been pushing regulators to ease up. Merski noted an encouraging sign in October when four regulatory agencies gave banks greater flexibility in writing down the value of bad commercial real estate loans on their books.