While members of Congress will return this week to Capitol Hill, they will also host fundraisers and travel to events across the nation to kickoff 2012 right.

Capitols vs. Penguins -Rep. Mark Critz, D-Pa. plans to raise cash on Wednesday at the NHL match-up between the Washington Capitols vs. Pittsburgh Penguins.  To join Critz, tickets start at $1,500 for PACs and $1,000 for individuals.

Goose Hunt – This weekend, Rep. Collin Peterson’s, D-Minn., Valley PAC is scheduled to host a Goose Hunt Weekend in Eagle Lake, Texas. This is not the first time the Valley PAC has hosted a bird hunt weekend. According to Party Time records, the organization has had seven similar events.

Hittin’ the Slopes – Rep. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, will head to the Sun Valley Resort in Idaho for SkiFest weekend Jan.13-14. This has been an annual event for Crapo since 2009.

GOP head to the Sunshine State – Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., is scheduled to be at the Annual Republican Majority Fund Weekend on Jan.13-14 in Palm Beach, Fla.

While Congress is out of session GOP Senators from Idaho, Mike Crapo and Jim Risch are extending a helping hand to Rep. Mike Simpson and freshman Rep. Raul Labrador, their counterparts in the House. They sent a letter to donors asking them to sponsor the “Idaho Congressional Gala,” with the proceeds going towards a joint fundraising committee for Simpson and Labrador. The April 29 event will be held at a hotel in Idaho and suggested contributions range from $500 to$2,500.

Spring is here again and it’s time for Rep. Gary Ackerman’s, D-NY, annual “Real Deli Event.” The congressman has planned this celebration of New York deli foods in April or May every year since at least 2008. This year’s event on May 3 promises to be the “WHOLE SCHMEER”, with a spread of food ranging from matzoh ball soup to hard salami. If you want to be the “Maven” of the event, your PAC will have to contribute  $5,000, while a PAC contribution of $2,500 will make you a respectable “Mensch.”

An invitation to another May 3 event is full of lawmakers with ties to the House Agriculture Committee or House Committee on Natural Resources or  both. The event is in honor of Rep. Gregorio Sablan, D-Northern Mariana Islands, at the Capitol Hill townhouse of the lobby shop Patton Boggs. Invitees to the event include Reps. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., the former chairman of the House Committee on Natural Resources, and Rep. Collin Peterson, D-Minn., the ranking member of the Committee on Agriculture.

Another upcoming event that might be attractive to the agriculture industry is the celebration of the 17th anniversary of the special election victory of Agriculture Committee Chairman Frank Lucas, R-Okla.

Last week Party Time reported on the lobbying efforts of AT&T in their campaign to gain approval for their proposed merger with T-Mobile. One of the events mentioned is the upcoming May 4 dinner in support of Rep. Dave Camp, R-Calif., the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. The event will be co-hosted by, among others, AT&T’s PAC and lobbyist Gregg Hartley of Cassidy and Associates, who lobbies for both AT&T and T-Mobile.

On the weekend of May 6, Churchill Downs will once again be host to the Kentucky Derby and, this time, Sen. David Vitter, R-La., will also be using it as a fundraiser for his leadership PAC. A contribution of $5,000 will get a pair of donors tickets to the clubhouse level, a dinner with the Senator in downtown Louisville, and two tickets to the winner’s party where donors will be joined by the governor of Kentucky and “other dignified guests.”

Lobbying firm Glover Park Group will be the site of two upcoming fundraisers for Democrats. On May 4, North Carolina Rep. G.K. Butterfield is putting on a “Eastern NC Barbecue Birthday Bash.” A week later the office is honoring Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass. at a breakfast in support of his leadership PAC. Hosts for the fundraiser include former Kerry aides Gregg Rothschild of the Glover Park Group, Brian Rice of Verizon and Barry LaSala of Elmendorf Strategies. They also include Bob Crowe of Nelson, Mullins, et al, who co-chairs Kerry’s leadership PAC, according to his bio. Nelson Mullins’ PAC contributed $7,500 to the leadership PAC in the 2009-2010 election cycle. Also hosting is Manny Ortiz of Quinn Gillespie and Associates.

With Boise State, an Idaho school which some observers say could win college football’s national championship this year, coming to the D.C. area to play its season opener on national television Monday night, Sen. Mike Crapo’s, R-Idaho, campaign team saw a chance to add to his war chest.

“It’s not far from the general election, and we’re fundraising. Period. So, it’s an opportunity that arose and people are excited about it,” said Jake Ball, the senior senator’s campaign manager.

The senior senator, running in November for a third term, will be rubbing elbows with high-rollers in a luxury suite — purchased directly from the stadium, the campaign said — at FedEx Field in Landover, Maryland, home of the Washington Redskins. According to the invitation, donors are asked to contribute the maximum campaign contribution for a ticket: $5,000-per-PAC and $2,400-per-person, and “payment is required to secure tickets.”

The Broncos are playing the Virginia Tech Hokies, a perennial powerhouse, in the so-called “Battle at the Capital.”

Thousands of Idahoans – including this cash-strapped family — will be traveling across the country to watch the Broncos, a smaller and newer program than the large schools it competes against.

“It’s a big deal because a team from Idaho would not normally travel to the East Coast to play a football game,” Ball said.

Crapo’s seat is safe, according to observers, but Ball said the campaign is going full steam ahead nonetheless.

At about $4 million, Crapo has already raised nearly double what he did for his 2004 campaign, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

Suites for the game are being sold for between $5,000 to $16,000, depending on the location and size of the suite, according to a FedEx Field ticket agent. Twenty-person boxes are on the low end, while 40-person boxes are pricier.

Senators Mike Crapo (R-ID) and Jim Risch (R-ID) have more in common than a love for their home state. The Idahoan Senators, who have been friends since serving in the state legislature together, both love trapshooting, flyfishing, and even sharing donors.  The longtime friends will be hosting fundraisers in Sun valley and Picabo on August 18th complete with shuttles and coordinated schedules.

Crapo’s “Hook ‘N Bullet” event kicks off at 5:30pm (pricetag: $2,500) with a reception in Ketchum where donors can sign up for horseback riding and fly fishing. Once guests have finished their orientation the party will move to the Dollar Mountain Lodge where they can partake in Risch’s second annual “Rocky Mountain Oyster Feed and Steak BBQ” (pricetag: $250-$1000).

Shuttles will be leaving Ketchum throughout the next day to whisk guests off for fly fishing on the Big Wood River, horseback riding and trap shooting at Silver Springs Ranch, and finally, the Hook ‘n Bullet Western Barbeque at 7:00pm.

Crapo showed his support for Risch for his 2008 race in the old fashioned way, by contributing the maximum of $10,000 via his leadership PAC, the Freedom Fund.

The two senators also shared several big-name corporate PAC and individual donors.  However, of the roughly 2,250 individual contributions to Risch, Crapo and Crapo’s leadership PAC in 2008, there were only a handful of out-of-state individuals who made multiple contributions of at least $1,000 to both Risch and Crapo.

Of note, former Shelby aide Lendell Porterfield–who represents the likes of Kynikos, Prudential and the American Bankers Association (Crapo happens to sit on the Finance and Banking Committees) and former Crapo chief of staff William Hollier. According to CRP data Porterfield contributed $10,600 to Risch, Crapo and Crapo’s PAC in 2008 alone.

Hollier, who has lobbied extensively on behalf of the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde (disclosure reports ranging from 2005 to 2009 are available here), contributed at least $4,000 to the two Idahoans in 2008 as well.  The CTGR, who spent roughly $590,000 on lobbying from 2006-2009, have been trying to build a racetrack somewhere in the northwest dating as far back as 2004 (Crapo also happens to sit on the Indian Affairs Committee).

When the Senate Finance Committee held a “roundtable discussion” the other week on “Financing Comprehensive Health Care Reform,” the public witness list included academics and representatives from liberal and conservative think tanks. What wasn’t on the agenda was a list of all the unofficial witnesses–all the donors who attend fundraisers for these lawmakers in the months surrounding this hearing, whose identities remain a mystery.

We found 44 fundraisers since the start of the year for members of the committee (See list below.) Whether or not the revelers have a stake in health care policy is tough to say for sure. For most of these parties, we don’t have a clue who attended (or for those in the future, who is planning to go.)

We know that on April 30, several lobbyists from the Timmons & Company, whose clients include the American Medical Association and Teva Pharmaceuticals, hosted a breakfast at The Monocle for New York Sen. Chuck Schumer. We know this only because this particular invitation is one of the few to list hosts for the event.

We also know that several of the hosts at Sen. Mike Crapo’s March 2 dinner at La Loma lobby for health care concerns. One was another Timmons & Company lobbyist, Ginger Loper. Another, Anna Sagely, lobbies for Hoffman LaRoche. And Amy Swonger lobbies for Ernst & Young, which includes Aetna and Johnson & Johnson among its clients.

Because we’re talking about the Senate, we don’t get easily digested details about campaign contributions received until long after an event. Senators file their campaign reports once every three months, so details for the second quarter of the year won’t be available until July 15. Even then, because senators have yet to pass a law requiring they file their records electronically, the only way to look up contributions would be in the old fashioned cumbersome way of going page by page. (That’s why we believe the Senate should pass S. 482 and finally join the internet age.) And even then it’s often difficult to match up contributions with any one event, since they aren’t necessarily recorded for that day or even that week.

But we do learn long after the fact that Senate Finance committee members collect many millions of dollars from health care donors and from lobbyists–check out this bar chart (click here) from the Center for Responsive Politics. So it’s an awfully good bet that there were many unofficial health care “witnesses” at all those parties for Senate Finance Committee members.

If an email could shout, the one I received this morning from a vacation lodging company would do it. “The snow is falling! Aspen/Snowmass has already received 2 feet of snow and more is on the way.” Yes, this is the time of year when we Denverites start to fantasize about how much snow is falling where and how we can manage to dodge traffic on I-70 to get to the mountains and start skiing on it.

And according to our Party Time database, at least five lawmakers have dreams of white fluffy stuff too–although to attend you or your PAC would have to chip in anywhere from $2,300 to $5,000 attend.

Here in Colorado, my own representative Colorado Democrat Rep. Diana Degette is planning a Vail ski weekend from Jan. 2 through Jan. 5.  The following week, Jan. 8 -11, Rep. Carolyn B Maloney (D-NY) is also planning a Vail get away. The same weekend, Sen. Tom Carper (D-DE) is planning to ski in nearby Beaver Creek in an event to benefit his leadership PAC, First State PAC.

Not that everybody skis in Colorado. Over in Idaho there are some big hills too. Sen. Mike Crapo (R-ID) is planning his annual ski fest in Sun Valley for February 6 – 8. And then there’s of course Alaska. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) plans to celebrate the 37th Iditarod with some skiing at the Aleyeska ski resort.

Perhaps there are other skiing fundraising events planned that we don’t know about. If you have heard about them, please send the information our way.