cannot disable safe_mode

[brian <brian@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

PHP 4.4.0
Apache 1.3.27
Fedora Core 2

I'm getting "SAFE MODE Restriction in effect." warnings when a script
attempts to use PEAR modules, but safe_mode shouldn't be on. phpinfo()
shows:

safe_mode 	On	On
safe_mode_exec_dir	/usr/local/php/bin	/usr/local/php/bin
safe_mode_gid	Off	Off
safe_mode_include_dir	no value	no value

Configuration File (php.ini) Path 	/usr/local/apache/conf/php.ini

# grep safe_mode /usr/local/apache/conf/php.ini (comments removed)
safe_mode = 0
safe_mode_gid = 0
safe_mode_include_dir = "/usr/local/lib/php"
safe_mode_exec_dir =
safe_mode_allowed_env_vars = PHP_
safe_mode_protected_env_vars = LD_LIBRARY_PATH
sql.safe_mode = Off

Anybody have an idea why my php.ini settings are not being read
properly? This is an old box which i don't really want to get into
upgrading right now, but i'd really like to be able to run something
from it for testing. I have no desire to use safe_mode here.

brian