A travel analyst says two significant fuel industry actions could raise Illinois gas prices.

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, or OPEC, announced this week that they would slow down on oil production in the coming months, resulting in less oil for the United States.

After a year of stalled contract negotiations, faculty members and professional staff at the seven City Colleges of Chicago on Thursday authorized a right to strike by the end of October.

With more than 1,000 members casting ballots, 92% of union members voted “yes” to authorize a strike, sending “a strong message that our members reject what the City Colleges is offering at the table,” Cook County College Teachers Union President Tony Johnston said.

Demands for a full-blown Department of Environment, more funding for the homeless and mental health and hiring incentives to reverse a record pace of police retirements emerged Monday as pressure points during the first day of City Council hearings on Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s $16.4 billion budget.

Although the police academy has been revving up and the Chicago Police Department’s recruiting team has been hitting military bases and college campuses nationwide, Budget Director Susie Park acknowledged police officers are still retiring faster than the city can hire replacements.

Three years after he failed to report sex abuse allegations at a North Side high school, the top official overseeing Chicago Public Schools’ military instruction program quietly resigned.

That resignation is the end of a saga that shows how military education leaders in Chicago played by their own rules — with devastating consequences for students who weren’t protected. The events happened in what CPS says is the nation’s largest Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, or JROTC, program, enrolling 7,300 students across 44 schools.

No tax or fee hikes are included in Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle’s $8.75 billion budget recommendation, which is a 7.8% increase over the county’s current spending plan.

“Cook County has encountered no shortage of challenges,” Preckwinkle said in a news release ahead of Thursday’s budget hearings. “Despite a pandemic, global economic turmoil and rising inflation, the fiscal condition of Cook County is strong. I am incredibly proud of what we have done to weather these storms, confront these obstacles, increase equity and turn adversity into opportunity.”