ST. LOUIS (KMOX) - The court battle over how far to go renovating the Edward Jones Dome is headed for arbitration this week.

At issue in the fight is how fancy does the dome have to become in order to keep up with the top 25 percent of stadiums in the National Football League. Kitty Ratcliffe, who runs the dome for the Convention and Visitors Commission, explains.

“It is exactly like a trial except without a jury. The jury is the panel of three arbitrators, none of whom are from the St. Louis area so they’re very impartial in terms of their interpretation of the law,” she said. “The arbitrators will not actually put a number to it. The arbitrators will decide which plan or combination of the plans meets the first-tier requirements and then we’ll have to go out and price that plan.”

The two sides are far apart. The CVC offered a $124 million dollar fix-up while the Rams want a major makeover valued at upwards of $700 million.

“It’s too hard to handicap because it’s going to be decided by a panel of arbitrators that we don’t know and we don’t know how they’re going to interpret the law but we feel we have a very strong plan,” Ratcliffe said.

Any deal which includes higher taxes would have to be approved by voters.