Gold Coast Deputy Mayor Donna Gates has refused to comment on a ruling handed down by the Councillor Conduct Tribunal and made public this week.

Cr Gates was re-elected unopposed in 2016 and the tribunal said information she subsequently submitted for a register of interests was misleading.

The Office of the Independent Assessor says 30 donations from a campaign fundraising race day — valued at more than $68,000 — were inaccurately described as race tickets on Councillor Gates's register of interests and another donation of $2,500 was not declared within 30 days.

Councillor Gates updated her register of interests in March this year, after she was notified of an investigation.

Tribunal finds misconduct was result of error

The Independent Assessor said the Councillor Conduct Tribunal accepted that both misconduct matters were the result of an error which Councillor Gates corrected when the issue was raised.

A former speaker of the Queensland Parliament, John Mickel, who is now an Adjunct Professor at the Queensland University of Technology said it was a big warning for anyone who wanted to run for local government.

"It costs a lot of money to run for office and if you are going to seek outside funding, make sure you do the book work correctly," he said.

Professor Mickel said Councillor Gates cooperated fully once she realised there was an error.

"It doesn't seem to me that Councillor Gates has been trying to hide anything," he said.

Local government under statewide scrutiny

Professor Mickel, who represented Logan in the State Parliament, said getting people to contribute to a campaign was the hardest thing he had to do.

"Modern campaigns cost a lot of money to run and the money is hard to find from a candidate's personal resources," he said.

He said Queensland's local government sector is under closer scrutiny than ever before.

"A cap and fully transparent disclosures are needed but I have some issues with [Queensland] laws on [banning] developer contributions," he said.

"I don't think local government should be the province of millionaires and the more choice [of candidates] the better."

The Gold Coast Mayor and CEO have also declined to comment on the findings of the Councillor Conduct Tribunal.

Councillor Gates is expected to contest the next local government elections in March.