Thank you, Jeff.
Joseph Glaser’s changes from this link ( [VNC Desktop / XFCE4] "Failed to connect to proxy" Issue - #19 by JPGlaser ) (from their final post there) worked for me. I guess it’s the same core issue. I also confirmed it did not break our Rocky 8 nodes (which would have been strange, but still good to confirm). Let me know if you think there is anything else to review. But I think we’re good to go now.