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Several Eastside cities have allocated emergency funds to open a third emergency winter shelter, this one for single women in Bellevue.

The shelter opened Wednesday, Jan. 20 in partnership with The Sophia Way and Catholic Community Services. It is located at Bellevue First Congregational Church and provides a safe, warm place for single adult women to sleep and eat during the winter. It adds 50 beds for the homeless on the Eastside.

Bellevue, Issaquah, Kirkland and Redmond provided additional emergency funding to open the shelter.

Angela Murray, executive director at The Sophia Way, said the shelter was a necessity,

“With the weather getting colder, we do not want women and families to be turned away,” she said in a release.

The shelter is scheduled to remain open throygh the end of February. Another Sophia Way-partnered shelter is at St. Peter’s United Methodist Church in Bellevue, which allows women and families with fathers and single fathers with children to walk in and receive a hot meal and a warm bed. It provides 50 beds.

Doors for the shelter open at 8:30 p.m. and people can stay until 7 a.m. the next morning.

Women have access to services during the day at the Day Center, 3032 Bellevue Way NE in the basement of St. Luke’s Lutheran Church. It opens at 8 a.m. and remains open until 3 p.m. for womena and families.

The men’s overnight emergency shelter has room for 100 beds for a total of 200 beds available to the homeless in Bellevue. All are open seven nights a week.

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