BATON ROUGE, La —After pushback on the mayor’s suggestion of reallocating a portion of library funds to address a police shortage and budget deficit, city officials have found a compromise: commissioning librarians and sending them out to assist the BRPD by responding to overflow calls between the hours of 9 pm and 5 am.

Through the newly formed “Read ‘Em Their Rights” program, librarians will be dispatched to police calls armed with carefully selected books for each type of call with the intent to de-escalate situations through literacy, rather than force.

“Our hope is that the right book can change a suspect’s outlook,” said BRPD Chief TJ Morse. “For instance, if a librarian gets dispatched to an assault call, he or she may bring a copy of Anger Management for Dummies – A step-by-step guide to throwing words, not punches. We are also suggesting they bring a hard cover copy of each book so they’ll at least be armed when things go south,” Morse chuckled.

Several librarians asked if they’d be receiving a hazard pay stipend, but were told that with only $95 million in surplus on hand, the library was a little short and unable to pay them any extra.

The program is set to roll out on March 1st.