An official with the municipality of Emerson-Franklin is voicing his concerns about refugees being housed in the community of Emerson.

Canada Border Services Agency requested help from Emerson's Emergency Community Coordinator in housing some of the 19 asylum seekers from Somalia and Djibouti who crossed into Canada from the U.S. illegally on Saturday morning. The CBSA facilities are not large enough to accommodate such a large crowd which is why the request for assistance was made.

The Emerson community centre was opened up to provide the refugees with a place to sleep while CBSA staff processed the families. That move, however, did not sit well with the reeve Greg Janzen.

"It's not really up to us to hold border jumpers in our complex with our volunteers working," said Janzen. "There should be security in place if they are being held in our hall here. We don't know if these people are good or bad, so we need to be careful."

Janzen says he has no problem helping these families and would be willing to open up the centre again, as long as CBSA or the RCMP can provide the security.

"It's not that we don't want to help, but we're just not set up for that kind of security. Our emergency coordinators are in place for emergencies, when highways are shut down or when there's an emergency event where we need to open up the complex. This is not an emergency situation. This is going up and above."

Janzen says it's likely more of these kinds of situations are going to arise now that U.S. President Donald Trump has issued a ban on seven Muslim countries.

"I guess Emerson seems to be a safe haven for these people," said Janzen, who intends to broach the issue of border security with Provencher MP Ted Falk this week.