The line kept growing - to 60 feet, to 70 feet, until 11 a.m. arrived and three Salt Lake School District employees started handing a white lunch sack to each child. As the children passed, a turkey and ham sandwich was dropped into each bag, joining the plums, milk and other food already inside.

This is a daily summer scene at Kearns Oquirrh Park, where by 1 p.m. an average of 860 lunches will be handed out. The free lunch, which is offered in 29 other Salt Lake City area parks, is one reason Utah's participation in the nation's Summer Nutrition Program is growing faster than almost anywhere else in America.

"We're feeding kids," said Kelly Orton, the child nutrition director for the school district. "The money doesn't go anywhere else. I can't think of a better program."

The program is designed to make school lunch a year-round food resource for lower-income families. Utah's increase is the third most rapid in the nation, according to a report by the Washington, D.C.-based, Food Research and Action Center (FRAC).

The report, released Thursday, is based on the number of children receiving free or reduced-price meals in July 2002 and 2003.

The number of Utah children benefitting from the summer program grew by 31 percent between the two years. Only Washington, D.C., which had a 47 percent increase, and Indiana, which grew by 33 percent, had a bigger jump.

With the growth, Utah ranks seventh nationally for participation.

For every 100 Utah children who receive school lunch during the academic year, 33 receive a meal during the summer, according to the report. That equates to more than 40,000 Utah children.

Jenifer Moffitt regularly takes her two children, ages 2 and 4, to parks throughout the Salt Lake Valley for the lunches. With a husband who attends college, money is tight for the Moffitt family, and the program helps, she said.

"It's great," Moffitt said, adding her kids prefer the sack lunches to home-cooked meals. "This is the only thing they eat. They don't eat at home. It's school lunch."

At the lunch sites, no ID's are checked and no money is handed over, Orton explained. "Anyone 18 and under, no questions asked."

Though Utah's program is doing well, FRAC wants the state to do better. "We hope they are reaching a lot more than this," said Randy Rosso, a FRAC senior policy analyst.

While Rosso concedes "maybe [the summer program] will never reach 80, 90 or 100 percent" of the school-year participants, FRAC is pushing every state to reach a level of 40 percent.

"Utah's almost at that level," Rosso said.

Only Washington, D.C., has topped 40 percent, while 16 states saw the number of children receiving food go down.

The program is federally funded, with no required match from the state or school district.

Statewide, there are about 150 sites where children can get the summer meals. Sixty-two sites are run by the Salt Lake School District, which operates the program in its own boundaries and in the Granite School District.

Utahns Against Hunger, a statewide nonprofit organization, is pushing for rural areas to pick up the program, looking beyond school districts to get it done. Advocate Steve Blackman said other nonprofit agencies, tribes and faith-based organizations are eligible for the same federal funds.

"The bottom line is: there are still areas of the state with low-income children . . . who need these resources in place," Blackman said.