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A $2,500 fine against City Councilor Don Harris for campaign reporting irregularities was deemed a modest victory on both sides of an attempt to recall the District 9 representative.

After a 7 1/2-hour public hearing that started Monday and stretched into early this morning, the city's Board of Ethics and Campaign Practices fined Harris $500 for each of five categories of campaign finance regulations.

They include failures to disclose contributions, to report bank account transactions and properly file campaign materials, and of exceeding campaign finance records - all relating to his successful 2005 City Council campaign.

Harris - a freshman councilor who on Oct. 2 faces the prospect of becoming the first elected city official to be recalled from office - called the ethics board ruling an "exoneration."

"It's also an admonition," he said shortly after the board's decision. "These are technical violations. Mr. (James) Lowe has been saying for months that there is fraud and wrongdoing. They clearly didn't find that."

Lowe, a retired Navy rear admiral and Four Hills resident who filed the complaint and is leading the recall effort, also considered the board's decision a victory.

"I consider it very much in my favor," he said. "I was frankly expecting it to be more."

The result came after a publicly televised hearing that was part courtroom trial, part public audit. Attorneys for Lowe and Harris parsed campaign minutiae such as individual contribution checks and how a candidate updates his finance records on the city's Web site.

The majority of the complaints against Harris stem from a June 2006 fund-raiser at a Nob Hill restaurant, in which Harris raised about $20,000 to repay campaign debt.

However, he also accepted 37 contributions in excess of the $480 limit, including three over $1,000, said Don Bruckner, Lowe's attorney. Harris also failed to report some of the contributions for more than a year, Bruckner said.

The complaint further claims that Harris used campaign money to pay off credit card debt without adequately documenting what was purchased.

Bruckner, in his closing arguments, said it was disconcerting that Harris failed to disclose details of a fund-raiser held seven months after he had been sworn into office.

"What's much more important is that one of your elected officials was raising money while in office . . . and received money from people who may have an interest in the decisions he makes," Bruckner said.

"This complaint goes to the heart of the integrity of our government and accountability," he said.

A separate complaint by former state Rep. Martha Lambert accused Harris of using city assets for campaign purposes by publishing his city e-mail address and a city phone number on a campaign Web site. The ethics board dismissed the complaint because Harris promptly corrected the error.

Harris admitted to errors in judgment and bookkeeping, but no wrongdoing.

He said he accepted contributions larger than the prescribed limit because of advice from Assistant City Attorney Mark Shoesmith. Harris said he was told that he could double the contribution amount because he was subject to both a general election and a runoff election.

He said his late campaign reports were the result of not pushing a button on the city's Web site that would have uploaded the data to a public campaign finance report site.

And he and his attorney, Douglas Antoon, said much of the campaign was financed out of Harris' own pocket, and that payments to his credit card were a means of reimbursing himself.

"I do apologize for creating some of this mess, because I did. I am responsible for not having better bookkeeping," Harris told the board. "However, these are all technical issues. There is no money missing. There is no intent here other than to disclose all of my contributors and pay myself back."

Harris also sought to characterize himself as caught in a political process engineered by soldiers for Mayor Martin Chavez, who would appoint his replacement if recalled. He said the timing of the hearing shortly before his recall election and the generation of an audit report he says is filled with errors were the result of city officials who work at the mayor's will.

"A lot of this is well-timed political theater," Harris said. "What the mayor would like is to appoint a rubber-stamp city councilor. I do admit my bookkeeping is certainly less than pristine, but this is much ado about politics."

Chavez's office issued a statement late Monday in response.

"Councilor Harris' ethics problems are entirely of his own making. Mayor Chavez is confident the ethics board will consider all the evidence. Whether Councilor Harris is recalled is entirely up to the voters of District 9."

The politics in this case are far from over.

The ethics board agreed to not consider the 3-inch-thick audit report Monday night since it reached beyond the scope of the original complaint. The board will, however, hear the case later, meaning Harris could be subject to more fines.

Lowe is confident the board will find more reasons to fine Harris, calling Monday's ruling "a tip of the iceberg."

But Harris, who appeared buoyant and confident throughout the hearing, left feeling strong going into the OCt. 2 recall election.

"It's a fair result. I admitted I made mistakes," Harris said afterward. "A lot of people are going to see a guy who does his best, who made accounting errors and got beat up for it."