Saturday, May 2, 2026
Friday, May 1, 2026
Thursday, April 30, 2026
First Fridays kick off in downtown Racine on May 1
RACINE -- The Downtown Racine Corporation's First Fridays kick off on May 1 with a Creative Crawl, a citywide celebration of art, creativity and community.
There will be hands-on activities, artist demonstrations, local author readings, pop-up exhibits and more from 4-9 p.m. throughout Downtown Racine.
Racine Art Museum, 441 Main St., will feature:
- A live set by DJ Unknown (5-8 p.m.).
- Interactive art stations for kids & adults (4-8 p.m.).
- Art Treasure Hunt with prizes.
- Meet the Artist: Amanda Browder (6:30 p.m. talk).
- Live Urban Sketching with Patti Fallon.
- Outdoor public art/postcard painting station.
- Artist demos throughout downtown featuring RAM artists.
Live art and hands-on experiences will include these venues:
- Revelyn Soul: Watch artist Erin Krembs create felted beads & animal sculptures.
- The New Café: Create beaded wind chimes with Pop-Up Adventures.
- Stitched: Fiber art demo with Sherrye Smith + explore Racine’s newest fiber arts hub.
- Art Metals Studio: Father/daughter duo showcasing painting/metalwork collaboration.
The Hotel Verdant, 500 Main St., is offering:
- A rare behind-the-scenes look at a private guest floor.
- Creative cocktail specials at Marguerite.
- A paper floral art demonstration with Laura Gillespie.
Among other highlights will be:
- Busia’s XOXO, 210 3rd St.: Hands-on cookie icing station.
- Photographic Design: Opening reception for the "Windows of the World" exhibit.
- Racine Art Guild, 419 6th St., Spring Juried Show.
- COP House: Student-made jewelry from repurposed materials.
- Over Our Head Players: Interactive puppet “Joke Booth.”
- Public art installations and demos throughout downtown.
Wednesday, April 29, 2026
Why Wisconsin gas prices are expected to jump dramatically
Caden Perry
Expect gas prices to shoot up dramatically in southeast Wisconsin soon, gas experts told the Journal Sentinel.
Refinery issues in Indiana will choke many Great Lakes markets into higher prices as soon as April 29 through May 1, GasBuddy head analyst Patrick De Haan said.
While southeast Wisconsin will be hit hardest with these refinery issues, blockage issues at the Strait of Hormuz will also increase gas prices across the board.
"The ceasefire did nothing, is doing nothing. The Strait is closed. There's a continued block on crude oil, and that is driving oil prices back up slowly but steadily the longer it continues," De Haan added.
Individual gas stations will set final prices, but De Haan said he saw many stations buying gasoline at a more expensive rate on April 28 already.
"Some stations may go up a big amount all at once, other stations may go up a little bit here and there for the next few days, but the numbers point to a pretty noticeable rise in price," De Haan said.
According to AAA, the average price per gallon in Wisconsin was $3.93 on April 28, up from $3.70 one week ago on April 21, one month ago at $3.64 on March 28 and up from one year ago at $2.99 on April 28, 2025.
The issue, De Haan described, is with a major refinery outage in Indiana. The Times of Northwest Indiana reported BP's Whiting Refinery suffered a power outage on April 27.
That's the second major shutdown since a fire at the refinery shut operations down for more than a week in October last year.
Business and Industry Connection Magazine also reported an ongoing labor dispute at the Whiting Refinery has locked out about 800 United Steelworks laborers since March 19.
Wisconsin's gas markets are split down the middle: eastern markets feed from Chicago-centered distributors and western stations from Great Plains markets.
The Whiting Refinery outage affected the Chicago markets much more than usual because other refineries have begun annual maintenance with spring's arrival.
"The Chicago market is kind of white-hot," De Haan said. "There's not as much capacity in the system while refineries are doing maintenance. There's less margin for error because if a refinery unexpectedly goes down, it's not like the others can just spring into action."
De Haan said the spike could take weeks to smooth back out, and the gap in Wisconsin will widen even further before courses are corrected.
Wisconsin average gas prices by metro area on April 28
Here's the average price per gallon for gasoline on April 28 from lowest to highest, according to AAA.
- Eau Claire: $3.68
- La Crosse: $3.77
- Superior: $3.83
- Pierce-St. Croix County: $3.84
- Janesville-Beloit: $3.93
- National average: $3.93
- Appleton: $3.94
- Milwaukee-Waukesha: $3.95
- Racine: $3.96
- Oshkosh: $3.96
- Madison: $3.97
- Wausau: $3.97
- Sheboygan: $3.99
- Kenosha: $3.99
- Fond du Lac: $4.00
- Green Bay: $4.00
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