California Regulators Miller, Chernow Replaced by Governor

California Governor Jerry Brown fired Derek Chernow, acting director of the California Department of Conservation, and Elena Miller, oil and gas supervisor at the department’s Division of Oil, Gas and Geothermal Resources, said Richard Stapler, spokesman for the California Natural Resources Agency.

“The governor chose to go in a different direction,” Stapler said in a telephone interview. Chernow and Miller, who were dismissed yesterday, were appointees and “served at the pleasure of the governor,” he said.