Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly, on Wednesday, held a ceremonial signing for a bill that allows the state of Kansas to transfer ownership of the Shawnee Indian Cemetery to the Shawnee Tribe. The half-acre plot near West 59thTerrace and Nieman Road in Shawnee is home to the gravesites of several Shawnee Tribe's ancestors. Chief Joseph Parks and family members of famous general Chief Bluejacket are among those buried at the site.For decades, the Kansas State Historical Society has managed the property. “This is such a small .5 acres,” said Shawnee Chief Ben Barnes. “Sometimes a .5-acre gesture is about justice and about acknowledgment.”The tribe plans to survey the land at the Shawnee Indian Cemetery to find any unmarked graves.The tribe hopes to begin a similar process at the Shawnee Manual Labor Boarding School, known as the Shawnee Indian Mission in Fairway.There are questions on whether young children are buried there in unmarked graves.“I think there's a lot of lessons that we can apply from what we did here with Senate Bill 405, that we can apply to future boarding schools,” Barnes said.The bill states the Shawnee Tribe agrees to pay all costs related to the conveyance and grants the State a historic preservation easement that will reflect current federal preservation laws regarding properties listed on the National Register of Historic Places.