Tammy Daigle has spent more than half of her life in the rural, northern Ontario community of Fauquier-Strickland, focusing on her family and rarely thinking about the small town’s finances.

But that changed in July when the township announced it was in a financial crisis with a $2.5-million operating deficit, sending shock waves through the community of around 500 people near Kapuskasing.

The municipality’s scramble to keep the lights on has led to a 20 per cent property tax hike for 2025, on top of last year’s 26 per cent increase. A staggering 80 per cent hike was even floated at a council meeting this summer.

Daigle and other residents have since formed a group of concerned taxpayers in an effort to find out how the municipality ended up in a situation that prompted intervention fro

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