By TRACY JOHNSON
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

Many worry the town's explosive growth will price them out.

Nearby hiking, mountain-biking and other outdoor activities drew True Kraft, 25, to Snoqualmie. Now he's searching for a house. Formerly a King County firefighter, Kraft eagerly applied to work in Snoqualmie when the city decided to form its own department earlier this year.

He's now one of 16 city firefighters in the small town, where he plans to stay.

"I'm not a big-city person," he explains, perusing local newspapers at the tiny county library next to the fire station.

He's not too worried growth will reshape the town he loves, but he has been struggling to find a decent, affordable place to live in the aging town.

Many of the old fixer-uppers he's seen need complete overhauls. One old house didn't even have a floor, he said.

Robert Squibb, 46, rents "one of the cheapest places around," a small, $400-a-month house. He believes rising property-tax bills and rents will hit people like him the hardest -- those working in downtown shops and making just enough money to get by.

"(It's) going to throw all us poor people out of the valley," he said.

He and Missy Conklin, who both work at the Coast to Coast hardware store, shake their heads at the idea of living on Snoqualmie Ridge.

"I can't even imagine someone moving out to the country, just to be able to reach out their kitchen window into someone's bathroom," Conklin says.