Brookhaven could soon join cities across the country that have adopted police-worn body cameras, largely out of a fractured trust between civilians and law enforcement.

The Brookhaven Board of Aldermen on Thursday discussed a request made by Police Chief Bobby Bell for $17,000 to be allocated to the Brookhaven Police Department budget for the purchase of body cameras.

Calls for police-worn body cameras surged after a white police officer in the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson fatally shot an unarmed black teen, Michael Brown, in August 2014.

“It’s becoming the thing all over the U.S. that they’re using,” Bell said. “Basically I want to cover any interaction my officer has with anybody in the public. It would cut down on a lot of complaints and in case we did have a situation of any type we would have it recorded.

“And it doesn’t have to be a shooting or a killing or [anything like that],” Bell said. “It would be turned on […] any time an officer has to go out in the public.”

Though there haven’t been any serious established needs for body cameras for Brookhaven’s police force, city officials are in support of the security measure intended to serve officers and civilians. Bell said the request would allow for each officer in the department to be outfitted with a body cam.

“Mainly in case something happened [like] what has happened in other cities,” Bell said. “[We] are a small city but that doesn’t mean that these things won’t happen in our town, so we want to be up on it and have the necessary equipment to record it.

Discussions about police cameras in Thursday’s budget work session centered around the pros and cons of body cameras as compared to vehicle dash cameras. Ward 1 Alderman Randy Belcher said he favored dash cameras, because he had used them when working for the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office and said they were effective. Belcher cited a wide image view, license plate visibility and the automatic element of dash cameras, which begin recording when blue lights are initiated.

“I’m going to go along with what the police chief wants, he knows what his department needs, [but] my preference is the dash cam because it takes the human error out of it, it comes automatically when the lights come on,” Belcher said. “Both sides have pros and cons. […] [A pro] of the body cam is that you’ll get a close-up shot of their face.

“We have actually talked about, it was Alderman Grice [who] said we may need to look at doing both, try to do dash cameras and body cameras,” Belcher said. “They actually weren’t that expensive and it could eliminate that human error.”

Though the board did not make any concrete decisions, the $17,000 was still in the budget as of Thursday and it seems BPD will keep the allocation. The board didn’t decide between body or dash cameras, but rather suggested looking into doing both. Belcher added had he used body cameras before he might prefer them, but his use of vehicle cameras and knowledge of their effectiveness created his bias.

“We did discuss the body cameras and would like to add the dash cameras. [With] so much stuff going on, we are definitely funding him with anything he needs,” Belcher said. “If we go with both of them we can’t go wrong. That’d really get us where we need to be. Anything we need to help the department we’re going to do.”

Both Bell and Belcher talked about special consideration when creating rules for the use of the cameras and the procedure for when they aren’t used as prescribed. Belcher and other members of the board talked about difficulty in reprimanding an officer for failing to turn their camera on, adding it would be a shame to discipline an officer for failing to do so if it wasn’t intentional. Some board members said that turning on a chest camera could easily be overlooked in the heat of the moment — when faced with unexpected danger or just the concentration required when approaching any situation.

Bell said because they are turned on manually, rules and regulations would be carefully created in conjunction with an attorney to provide for all possible considerations.

“My rule would be any time you encounter the public you need to have it on,” Bell said. “Just like anything else you’ve got to learn it, get used to it and then it becomes the norm — just another part of your equipment.”