This week, Chicago's mayor, Rahm Emanuel, and Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson announced that the city has reached its goal of equipping all of its 7,000 police officers with body cameras, and that it had done so a year earlier that anticipated, WGN News reports.

Police and community relations have been damaged in recent years, particularly following the shooting of Laquan McDonald, and the subsequent cover-up of the footage of that shooting.

The mayor expressed hope that the cameras will not only make citizens feel safer, but that it will make police officers feel more at ease as well.

Emanuel pointed to the case of a traffic stop during which Congressman Bobby Rush claimed he was racially profiled; the officer who stopped him disagreed, and bodycam footage cleared that cop of any wrongdoing.

"That officer happened to have a body camera, Congressman rush had a different remembrance of that incident. The body camera showed what the officer said," the mayor said.

The bodycam initiative started in 2015 on the city's Northwest Side in response to a number of shootings by Chicago officers. Residents wanted answers and a sense of accountability from the officers patrolling their neighborhoods.

What began as a pilot program is now the largest bodycam deployment in the nation.

Each of the cameras has a manual on/off switch, and can record 72 hours of footage on a single charge. Recorded footage will be accessible to the public through the Freedom of Information Act, meaning anyone can request footage if police use force, in the case of an arrest, or for an allegation of misconduct.

According to The Associated Press, besides community desire for them, the U.S. Justice Department's January report, which detailed the Chicago Police Department's civil rights abuses, was a major factor in pushing out the cameras.

So far, reviews of the cameras have been positive. Alderman Walter Burnett said the cameras are already helping restore positive police-and-community relations.

"Guys have to be more sensitive, as you can see now, they even have to be able to articulate themselves on television now, on camera, right? So they have to be aware of what they say, how they say it and how they move, so I think we’re creating a more conscious police department," Burnett said.