In Durham, it depends on whom you ask.

Residents of Tyler Court, a central Durham cul-de-sac, will urge the City Council today to kill plans for two new streetlights.

Residents of other neighborhoods, including Watts Hospital-Hillandale and Trinity Park, also have criticized the city's policy of installing streetlights if police think an area is dangerously dark.

They point to some studies that suggest streetlights do not reduce crime. Tyler Court residents even have highlighted research that links nighttime light exposure to a heightened risk for breast cancer.

"We want to be able to go into the yard with our children and catch fireflies at night. We want to be able to look up at the sky and teach them about constellations," said Bernadette Chasteen, a Tyler Court resident whose husband, David, will appeal to the council today at its work session. "We don't want to have to go out to a remote location to do those things."

But other residents, including the Rev. Melvin Whitley, a community activist, think streetlights deter crime. Whitley says the people worried about light pollution don't live in what are considered dangerous areas. In these neighborhoods, he says, people can't catch fireflies, gaze at the stars or do much of anything outside at night for fear of crime. He rattled off a host of streets in high-crime areas that need more, not less, light.

"We've found over our years of experience that it's the unlighted neighborhoods where criminals tend to congregate outside," Whitley said. "We welcome any opportunity for the city to lighten up our community."

Opponents of the lights point to some studies showing that adding streetlights did not lead to a statistical decrease in crime.

But Mark Rea, director of the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's Lighting Research Center in Troy, N.Y., said other research suggests that streetlights can make certain places safer.

Rea also dismissed the argument that streetlights could cause cancer. Some research has linked nighttime light exposure to a reduced production of melatonin within the body, increasing cancer risk.

He noted that cancer rates appear to vary based on when people are exposed to light and dark. Night-shift workers, for example, showed higher cancer risks.

Rea sympathizes with those upset about light pollution. He said he lives in a rural area and fought hard when some neighbors wanted to erect streetlights.

"But I would not invoke breast cancer as a reason not to do that," he said.

Rea said different lighting criteria should be considered in high-crime areas.

Council member Mike Woodard said that's his goal, but he's not sure what a revised policy to achieve that goal might look like.

"This is one of those King Solomon-type of decisions," he said, noting that he has seen a number of studies that seem to bolster both sides of the debate. "Given that the data are inconclusive, I think there is a lot of middle ground here."