Okanagan Humane Society rescues 21 cats from one home.

[Catherine]

The old guy meant well, but he made it worse.

An older woman in my neighborhood died and left two female cats. They mostly lived outside and her family might not have known she was feeding them.
If they had been taken to a shelter then, there were just two of them. A couple of women in the apartment nearby decided to feed them. They wouldn't take the two cats in, but they fed them. In about two years there were 40 cats. The two women couldn't afford to feed 40 cats. So the cats were hungry.
They were in terrible shape. Some of them were really feral and couldn't be tamed. They got injured by raccoons. It was sad.
Fortunately they had started the Trap Neuter Release program by then. They took over the situation and neutered and vaccinated the cats. 
They set up a location and time for feeding the cats and regular volunteers looked after them. With no more kittens being born, the numbers dropped and eventually there were no more strays. 
Just helping the first two cats properly would have prevented a lot of suffering. Even getting them spayed would have helped. It would have been cheaper than feeding 40 feral cats.