Stephen Scarborough is out at Standard Pacific Corp., the Irvine-based homebuilder said on Thursday.
Scarborough, chairman, chief executive and president of Standard Pacific, is retiring after a 27-year career with Orange County’s largest homebuilder.
He’s been replaced by Jeffrey Peterson, who has served as a director of Standard Pacific since 2001 and as lead independent director since 2004.
The executive change comes as Standard Pacific has been working to lighten its debt load and shed assets amid the tough housing market.
The company counts a market value of about $340 million, down from more than $2 billion in mid-2005.
In a conference call, Peterson praised Standard Pacific’s management team for their recent efforts in generating cash and selling off land and projects, but said the board felt that more urgency was needed to be given to the company’s long-term strategy.
“We will move quickly and decisively” on long-term issues facing the company, he said.
Peterson had been engaged in private investment for the past few years. From 1992 to 2005, he served as a managing director for Los Angeles-based Trust Company of the West.
Peterson, 62, said the contract for his new job is open-ended, and is not an interim position.
Scarborough started with the company in 1981, acting as president of Standard Pacific’s Orange, Los Angeles, San Bernardino and Riverside divisions.
He was elected president in 1996, appointed CEO in 2000, and chairman in 2001. He was inducted into the California Building Industry Hall of Fame in 2000.