Found the problem. With “editable pin labels” set to true Fritzing substitutes a hard coded svg internally for schematic (presumably so it knows where the pin labels are.) I replaced my original part with one that has the schematic svg modified (and which looks invalid but isn’t as it will be substituted) to match the substitute svg so the labels and outline are in the correct place. Long term, I would like to remove that hard coded svg from the code because as noted it is ugly and violates the rule of least astonishment.
Peter