AUBURN – Ray Gagne thanks God for his retirement account.

Cashing it in is the only way he’ll be able to pay his property taxes this year.

“They’ll charge me a fee to do it, but it’s my only choice right now,” said Gagne, 83, of 50 Sunset Ave. “My income’s pretty much level, so I’m not ready to deal with more costs. But what else can I do?”

Gagne, like the thousands of Auburn residents who received their tax bills in the mail this weekend, won’t be happy writing the check to the city next month. But he’s grateful his bill didn’t go up as much as it could have, and he’s worried about what he’s going to do next year if it goes up again.

“I won’t say how much it went up, but it’s somewhere between $200 and $300 more than I can afford,” he said. “But there’s not a lot I can do about it.”

A citywide property revaluation led to a tax revolt last year after the city mailed notices showing property values – and taxes – doubling or tripling for many homeowners. The revolt led to the creation of a new tax reform group, United Citizens of Auburn, and extra public scrutiny of the City Council’s budget-review process.

Councilors this spring decided to phase in the new property values, lessening the impact on taxpayers. Bills for individual homeowners would increase, but not as much the first year.

Lorraine Bilodeau of 149 Lake St. didn’t know how much her tax bill had increased. She glanced at it Friday when it came in mail, saw that it was more than $2,000 and looked away.

“It’s my husband’s job to worry about, anyway,” she said. “Knowing more would just make me feel bad.”

Bilodeau said she’s sure they’d pay their taxes, but she didn’t know how.

“The thing is, I love this neighborhood,” she said. “I love my children’s school. I don’t want to leave, but I’m afraid I won’t have any choice if this continues.”

For Fred Carpentier of 134 Cook St. it was more a question of how the money is spent. He’s glad his taxes didn’t increase as much as he thought they would.

“But it’s still too much,” he said. “They can move things around, phase in property values here and change the tax rates there, but it’s the city’s spending that starts it. They waste money, and this is what happens.”

The first payment is due Oct. 16, but some people have already paid, said Tax Collector Kathy Levesque. Banks and mortgage companies that hold escrow accounts for property taxes had already made their payments and some individual taxpayers had begun to pay theirs.

“All in all, they’ve been pretty positive,” Levesque said. “I think people were surprised that their taxes were not as much as they thought they’d be.”

Levesque said her office is prepared to answer questions, go over bills and explain how they’ve been figured.