MySQL – Resolving Connection Issues from Apache Server

I am operating on Centos7 and Mysql 5.6.46. I needed to move the default datadir location to an encrypted partition and I changed my default /etc/my.cnf file accordingly:

# For advice on how to change settings please see
# http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.6/en/server-configuration-defaults.html

[mysqld]
#
# Remove leading # and set to the amount of RAM for the most important data
# cache in MySQL. Start at 70% of total RAM for dedicated server, else 10%.
# innodb_buffer_pool_size = 128M
#
# Remove leading # to turn on a very important data integrity option: logging
# changes to the binary log between backups.
# log_bin
#
# Remove leading # to set options mainly useful for reporting servers.
# The server defaults are faster for transactions and fast SELECTs.
# Adjust sizes as needed, experiment to find the optimal values.
# join_buffer_size = 128M
# sort_buffer_size = 2M
# read_rnd_buffer_size = 2M
datadir=/NEW_FOLDER/mysql
socket=/NEW_FOLDER/mysql/mysql.sock

# Disabling symbolic-links is recommended to prevent assorted security risks
symbolic-links=0

# Recommended in standard MySQL setup
#sql_mode=NO_ENGINE_SUBSTITUTION,STRICT_TRANS_TABLES 
sql_mode=""

[mysqld_safe]
log-error=/var/log/mysqld.log
pid-file=/var/run/mysqld/mysqld.pid

[client]
port=3306
socket=/NEW_FOLDER/mysql/mysql.sock

After restarting, I verify that I can connect to Mysql by writing: mysql -u <USERNAME> -p, no issue there.
What my issue is has to do with when my CGI-based server is trying to access the DB. I get the error: Error connecting to database: Can't connect to local MySQL server through socket '/var/lib/mysql/mysql.sock' (2) which does not make much sense to me since the default socket directory has changed.

I looked into the Apache error log and I see this:

DBI connect('testuser:localhost','testdb',...) failed: Can't connect to local MySQL server through socket '/var/lib/mysql/mysql.sock' (2) at /srv/www/TestSite/perl-lib/Database.pm line 31.

I go to line 31 and I see this:

my $dsn = "DBI:mysql:testdb:localhost";
    $dbh = DBI->connect($dsn, 'testuser', 'testpasswd')
      or throw Portal::DatabaseError("Error connecting to database: $DBI::errstr");

The way I see it, Apache is trying to access Mysql but it cannot use the mysql.socket from the new default mysql datadir location. Any ideas what to do?