The tower pillar should be configurable to load a specific top file based on the salt environment, e.g.:
ext_pillar:
- tower:
salt:env:
base: /srv/salt/pillar/tower.sls
staging: /src/salt/pillar-staging/tower.sls
This way one can have different pillars directories/checkouts for different environments and easily test changes on actual minions by passing the e.g. staging environment to a highstate.