MILLBRAE, Calif. (KGO) — Mayor of Millbrae, Anders Fung tells the I-Team, “It’s just, you know, there’s a lot of information here that that is disturbing, right?” He’s calling for a thorough investigation into his police chief who lives in Idaho and slept in the police station during the workweek, until the ABC7 I-Team investigated.

This situation raises so many questions, and overnight we saw tense exchanges at the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors over this issue. Once again, the I-Team’s Dan Noyes gave Millbrae Police Chief Eamonn Allen a chance to respond in person and he remained silent.

“Yeah, and that needs to be proven,” Mayor Fung said. “I still need to be able to get the facts of those allegations. And, you know, I have not heard from the chief, so that’s important.”

EXCLUSIVE: Millbrae police chief facing questions for allegedly commuting to work from Idaho

But it’s been five days since Noyes’s first report and Chief Allen was sitting there during the City Council’s public comment. He left right after, and the I-Team caught up with him at the police station’s front door.

“Eamonn, have you found a place to stay besides the police station?” Dan Noyes asked. “Do you have any comments about the report?”

Beyond the issue of using taxpayer facilities for personal benefit, this raises questions about a first responder with a 646-mile drive to work or 1.35-hour flight.

Richard Corriea, former SFPD Commander said this about the situation, “Not able to return to work on short notice in the event of an emergency is ridiculous.”

The City of Millbrae contracts with the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office for law enforcement services. Eamonn Allen acts as Millbrae police chief, but he’s also a sheriff’s captain. Tensions rose over this controversy at last night’s Board of Supervisor’s meeting.

Supervisor Noelia Corzo said, “I’m going to clarify something that I wish, frankly, our board president would have when he spoke to the press.”

Corzo criticized Board President David Canepa because he expressed concern about the issue in our original report, saying “If someone is living out of county or out of state, they have to pay for their own lodging, meaning San Mateo County is not a Holiday Inn.”

Corzo said, “I want to make sure the public knows that it is actually very common practice for most law enforcement agencies, including ours, to have sleeping quarters available to their staff.”

Canepa explained he has no issue having beds available to deputies who work a night shift and must appear in court the next morning, for example. But he has questions about sheriff’s employees with homes far out of state, who stay here on the county dime during the workweek.

Canepa told Corzo, “If you don’t believe looking into something like this is in good policy, I don’t know what to tell you.”

Supervisor Ray Mueller interjected, “All right. Okay. Order! Yes. Done, guys. Point of order, please.”

Board President David Canepa: So, I think I’ve made my point very clear.”
Supervisor Ray Mueller: “You guys have both made your points.”
Canepa: “Mr. Mueller. I’m chairing the meeting respectfully.”
Mueller: “Please, chair and then chair it now.”
Canepa: “Thank you. Respectfully. Thank you.”

In the board meeting, Supervisor Corzo did not mention the most important issue of all. How can these first responders quickly get to a catastrophic event – a mass shooting or an earthquake, for example – if they are at home out of state, hundreds of miles away? Investigations are moving forward on the city and county level.

Take a look at more stories by the ABC7 News I-Team.

A Bay Area police chief set up a bed in his local station where he reportedly slept during the week before returning to his home more than 600 miles away in Idaho on the weekends — prompting calls for his removal.

Eamonn Allen, chief of police in Millbrae, about 15 miles south of San Francisco, is the subject of a formal complaint filed by the city manager to the county attorney.

The complaint was triggered by a bombshell KGO-TV report that included photographs of two bedrooms that had been added to the Millbrae police station since Allen became chief of police sometime before summer of 2024.

An examination of property records found that Allen bought a home just outside Boise, Idaho in June of last year, according to the local outlet.

When asked whether he was living in Idaho, Allen declined to respond to KGO-TV.

The formal complaint filed against Allen states that the police chief used the police station “as bedroom facilities” since he “now resides in the Boise, Idaho area.”

According to Millbrae’s Code of Ethics, “[n]o public employee shall use…city owned property for personal need, convenience or profit.”

“If someone is living out of county or out of state, they have to pay for their own lodging, meaning San Mateo County is not a Holiday Inn,” San Mateo County Board of Supervisors President David Canepa told local ABC affiliate.

“We need to see was someone living in there permanently?” Canepa said.

“These are taxpayer dollars and so we need to make sure that what’s taking place in those facilities really is for the good of the taxpayer. That means people aren’t living there.”

Police officers who work a night shift and need to appear in court the next day are given beds, but those are exceptions to the rule, according to Canepa.

Law enforcement experts also said that the fact that Allen lives so far away is problematic, given that police heads need to be able to respond at a moment’s notice in case of an emergency.

Richard Corriea, a former commander in the San Francisco Police Department, told KGO-TV that “not [to be] able to return to work on short notice in the event of an emergency is ridiculous.”

A chief of police must be available to respond immediately in case of a high-profile crime, earthquake or some other disaster.

“You’d want a police chief that’s a stakeholder in the community and able to experience the community at a granular level to really understand it and know what’s going on, and also to be present on short notice,” Corriea said.

The KGO-TV investigation also discovered that at least six sergeants in the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office lived out of state — in Idaho, Nevada, Texas and Tennessee.

Two of those sergeants work on the bomb squad, where deputies are paid nearly $600,000 a year, including benefits.

The Post has sought comment from the Millbrae Police Department and the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office.